It was right and timely that public intellectual Professor Bolaji Akinyemi warned last week that the greatest problem staring Nigeria in the face concerning the up-coming national Elections is not about who wins or loses but about how prepared Nigeria is to manage the Violence preparatory to the Elections, during the Elections and the certain violence that historically attends results of elections in Nigeria.
The major cause of violence in the past had been the prevalence of obvious injustice in the land and which the electorate had always hoped would disappear once those perceived to be oppressing them were removed from power. More often than not, the reverse was always the case when those in power had always sought to retain the status quo.
Another major cause is usually the availability of muscled men who are ready to fight to the death in furtherance of their employers’ bidding. These muscled men, usually vagrants and vagabonds, popularly known as thugs are armed to the teeth with all manner of weapons and are unleashed on the society.
Contestants to power and position are also another major cause of fear before, during and after elections. They too, usually madly desperate for power, would go to any length, foul or fair, to out manoeuvre their opponents and gain control. In the process, threats are issued, wild and uncouth language is lavishly deployed, and the polity gets seriously heated up.
Money also plays a major role in the scenario that usually plays itself out before, during and after elections. Money actually is the root, the trunk and the branches of all the problems and fears afore-mentioned.
Why should this be so? The reason is not far fetched. Majority of contenders for power and position do not discuss issues. And aside from the First Republic when some semblance of political parties existed and individuals running for office explained their Manifestoes to the electorate, often times since then, Nigeria merely relied on mushroom cults and associations masquerading as political parties.
It is the individuals in all these associations that pushed themselves to the front burner and are selected/chosen/picked by larger members of the cult/associations to run for office. Let me quickly say that there had been a very few exceptions.
With no real programmes or plans for the people, and no real Manifesto by the cult/association, individuals gunning for office fall back on their own designs and devices. The easiest weapon available is character assassination. Contenders spend more time researching the failures and failings of their opponents than they spend on what they intend to offer the electorate if voted into power.
When character assassination fails, when foul language fails, when threats fail, then the gate is open for thuggery, butchery and cold blooded murder, leading to a chain of gory consequences.
All these thoughts must have been at the back of Professor Akinyemi’s mind. A former Federal Minister, a University teacher of four and a half decades, an Elder Statesman and a man who has travelled the world Akinyemi surely knows what he is talking about.
Now, therefore, as judges would say, the way out of these fears is to promote issue based discourse as the basic essential of our political arena.
Politicians of all shades and colours must submit to the veritable culture of debate. And when they debate, they must debate issues. And there are so many issues to debate and discuss. We have corruption as our middle name. We have power epilepsy as our number one disease. We have armed robbery, kidnapping, ritual killings and other manifestations of insecurirty as our major pre-occupation, we have unprecedented greed as our national malady, we have a totally collapsed infrastructure as a major stumbling block, we have a collapsed education infrastructure as our dilemma, and amongst numerous others, we have collapsed hospitals and health care as our sure passport to the grave. These are issues begging for solution.
We may, for comic relief, talk about wives who speak English like totally uneducated fellows and with voice modulation like when an Ekiti man speaks with badly prepared pounded yam in his throat or an Ijebu struggling with poorly prepared ikokore in his mouth. We may entertain ourselves with the idea of leaders who are ruled not by their head, but by the pendulum dangling between their thighs. All those could come in once in a while as comic punch, but not as the core issue in a debate.
Nigerians must take politics more seriously and attach greater importance to the very survival of the country. After all, this money been stolen will no longer be available for stealing if there is no country to bleed to death.
And it should also be emphasised that politics should NEVER be allowed to create enmity between friends, more so in Nigeria where there is not much difference between one party and the other. What exists is the fact that some political associations consist of by far more terrible human beings than the other, especially by their performance, character and utterances.
There are some governors in the two leading political associations in Nigeria who will make excellent President, [if not obstructed by the vultures in their party] while also in the two political associations there governors who are not qualified, by their performance, for local government chairmanship position!
If politics in Nigeria is issue based, two brothers of the same parents are welcome to belong to two different political associations. Must they be enemies if their goal is to serve the common good to the best of their abilities and in the best way they know even with different and opposing approaches?
However we should be able to differentiate between being nice and being a good leader. There are so many nice and gentle individuals out there who are very poor, extremely poor in their leadership resume. What Nigeria needs now at this point in time more than any period in her history is VERY strong, capable, visionary, and ACCOUNTABLE leadership.
Let Nigerians take Professor Akinyemi’s fears very seriously or we find ourselves marching to Somalia or Rwanda after the elections!
The pen is the tongue of the hand,the silent utterer of words for the eyes…Henry Beecher
