cartoonBeyond the pantomime of backslapping and the euphoria of
excitement that attended the outcome of the June 21, 2014 governorship
election in Ekiti State, the victory of the opposition Peoples
Democratic Party (PDP) over the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC)
has some fundamental lessons. One, it has confounded the bookmakers who
dismissed Mr. Ayodele Fayose of the PDP as simply a “thug” who would not
match the intellectual fireworks of a presumed philosopher-king. The
outcome of the election also made nonsense of the alliterative
desperation of headline casters who openly denigrated the PDP flag
bearer and
gave a phantom or paper victory to the incumbent without
recourse to Edmund Burke’s dictum in political prediction, that the
platoon of the politician is his home front, not his intellectual or
academic prowess. In fact, another huge lesson from the Ekiti electoral
tango is that pathological riggers often cry more than the bereaved but
eventually become losers if there is no conducive atmosphere for them to
ply their trade.
Yet the biggest lesson is that the Ekiti election should serve as a
better guide to the future of electoral contests in Nigeria. The
presence of unbiased and disinterested security forces helped to
forestall rigging and other forms of lawlessness including outright
violence. While the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC)
must be commended by all well-meaning Nigerians for a job well done,
kudos must be given to President Goodluck Jonathan for the courage to
manifest the political will to ensure that the election was free and
fair. The incumbent governor, Dr. John Kayode Fayemi, the quintessential
public intellectual and urbane journalist who lost out to Mr. Ayodele
Fayose, is the ultimate winner. This point is very important and may be
emphasized by an anecdote. The emotional legacy which Fayemi has created
in Ekiti by accepting defeat and attributing the verdict to the will of
the people is so intense in Ekiti State, but it is yet deeper and even
more fervent across Nigeria.
Therefore, the crowning achievement of the Ekiti 2014 governorship
election is that it illuminates today’s profound changes through the
great sweep of history. The election conveys the new reality of
Nigeria’s politics with a sure grasp and unique vision. It is a
resounding achievement. Indeed, the past and future of Nigeria had been
simultaneously on sale before the emergence of Dr. Goodluck Jonathan as
President through a curious twist of fate and ironies. It is this that
has made Jonathan to be wholly driven by the pulse of the nation. In
2011, he superintended a general election that was accepted by both
local and international observers as generally free and fair and thus
won a pan-Nigerian mandate through a landslide victory. But,
unfortunately, those overzealous but shortsighted Nigerian spin doctors
and self-styled political pundits desperately bent on frustrating
Jonathan out of power have lost all sleep in a veil attempt at
disguising the meaning of “progressive politics”.
Yet, indeed, to imagine that even at the turn of the twenty-first
century, Nigerian politicians could be so manifestly crude and
villainous as to sponsor the grueling assassination of their opponents
is to contemplate the mere labeling of a man who plays politics by the
rules as “clueless” a generous exercise. The only stock-in-trade of the
opposition politicians and their media yes-men is to abuse the sitting
president, employing the most acidic language to ridicule him. It is not
as though they possess any ideological superiority. No! They are only
deepened in the narrow provinces of tribal and religious advocacy. Just
see how Kwakwanso and Nyako manifest arbitrary disoriented latitudes in
the gallery of power. See how the opposition could descend so low as to
employ the tawdry spectacle of self-absorption and the incredible badge
of democratic identity to insult the president of this country.
If progress in politics is all about character assassination,
employment of volatile language to disparage others and inciting the
governed against the government, then this opposition is yet to evolve
alternative measures to replace the ruling party in the corridors of
power. The opposition has caved into insignificance for lack of internal
cohesion and necessary progressive plans and impetus to achieve their
mission except by threat of violence. Rather than issue-based, elections
in Nigeria are still largely personality, religious or tribal stunts.
How then can we now set aside age-old prejudices and play this game of
politics according to the rules? In the realm of planning, ideological
depth and profundity as well as purity of intention, patriotic fervor,
legitimacy and popular acceptability, the 2015 general election promises
to bear a redeeming grace going by the spectacular outing of INEC on
Saturday.
More than fifteen years of uninterrupted civil rule is enough for
Nigerian politicians to be particularly immersed into real democratic
culture. This democracy must be anchored on a series of informally
agreed conventions and operating ground norms best referred to as
democratic agreement. As against what obtained in the past when there
was a constant diatribe between political parties which attested to a
deformed polity, there must be a genuine re-alignment of forces this
time around. A democratic agreement is vital for the smooth operation of
this civil rule and it will guarantee its acceptance and longevity. In
the absence of one, it is inevitable that the politics of blood and
thunder would replace discourse as the acceptable means of settling
disputes. But all of this comes at a cost. It is the fear and loathing
over the politics of do-or-die promoted by those who go into politics
not to serve the people but their narrow interest that is keeping men
and women of credible disposition from partisan politics.
If Nigerian politicians would be courageous enough to drop their
pull-him-down syndrome and develop the political will to lift the nation
from the stranglehold of underdevelopment, the people will be the
ultimate beneficiaries. But it is potentially disastrous that ours is
party politics gone mad, where opposition politicians no longer have
regards for the exalted office of the President. The Ekiti election has
come primarily to prick the bloated ego of the opposition, that politics
is not about noise-making but that of building bridges of love, hope
unity and peace. This, exactly, was what Fayose did in Ekiti between May
29, 2003 and October 16, 2006 when he was impeached by powerful forces
in Abuja for failing to do their bidding. The Ekiti verdict has thrown a
pebble on the opposition’s pool of complacency and placid hypocrisy.
Without internal democracy, it is difficult for any opposition party to
beat the PDP.
• Amor is of the Communication and Strategy Directorate of Transformation Ambassadors of Nigeria (TAN).
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