The year 2015 has been quite
popular with many Nigerians for two major reasons: the Millennium
Development Goals and the reported break-up of Nigeria by the United
States of America. The break-up “prediction” has since been denied by
the US. The elections came into the fray of the 2015 conversation as
soon as the 2011 elections ended.
Now, we are here, 2015 has not only
come, we are now in the very month of Nigeria’s crucial presidential
election. In 10 days, Nigerians will either be electing a new president
or keeping faith by re-electing the incumbent. A lot has gone down over
the 2015 battle but one will highlight a few of the beautiful and the
ugly sides. It is indeed a shame to see men who once took arms against
the state and got rewarded for it suddenly become the Chief Threat
Officers of the Federation. The likes of Asari Dokubo, Tompolo and
Boyloaf have been sounding it loud and clear that if Nigerians don’t
return President Goodluck Jonathan at the polls this month, they will
pay for the cost of the decision. As we speak, these men continue to
walk the streets of Nigeria as free men, no invitations to the
Department of State Service or even the police. These ones appear to be
overlords in the Nigerian geographical space as they are seemingly above
the law. One wonders how their declarations of threat to the Nigerian
people will help their candidate but you never know, human beings are
indeed more irrational than rational.
Did you see the Nigerian Elections
Debate Group’s Vice-Presidential debate on national television stations
last Sunday? Let us just say some of those candidates have no business
anywhere near Aso Rock except when the gates are thrown open for all and
sundry. There is no need to mention names but there were candidates who
looked like they had never even given a thought to the plans they had
for the country. It did appear that being the vice-presidential
candidate of a political party was the sole ambition and getting a
chance to be on national television was just the icing on the cake for
some of them. It was indeed disgraceful to say the least. One day, every
Tomiwa, Dike and Kasali would not look at our seat of power and just
think all they need to do is make themselves available irrespective of
their readiness.
Those calling for the postponement of
the elections have based their unacceptable proposition on INEC’s
readiness and Permanent Voter Cards’ collection. First off, let me state
that the elections should not be postponed for any reason. We had at
least four years to prepare for this, waiting another six months will
not make INEC readier than it is today. We have to get along with it. If
you are reading this and you have yet to collect your PVC, you have
chosen to disenfranchise yourself. It would be understandable if you are
one of those Nigerians who somehow disappeared from INEC data or for
some reason, including being away from Nigeria until now, you never got
to register for the elections.
Some people say they wouldn’t vote
because they don’t believe in both candidates. Not voting is a choice
too. No matter how much you want to pretend about it, if both candidates
don’t excite you, there would be a few people in their team or
potential cabinet members who ought to at least get you interested. We
cannot expect a country bedevilled by poor leadership to start its
journey to exceptional leadership by arriving at that point immediately.
No journey starts with arriving at the destination; that is a later
reward for starting. We will get there.
The National Human Rights Commission is
committed to stamping hate speech out of the polity, especially in this
season of election campaigns. It organised a media parley where
discussions were held on the way forward. There was also a social media
engagement, #NoHateSpeechNG where the Chairman of the commission, Prof.
Chidi Odinkalu, discussed the subject matter extensively while Nigerians
from across the world made their contributions. A lot of the campaign
content and ads have been filled with hate messages. Governor Ayo
Fayose’s “dead North-West leaders” ad featured greatly both at the
offline discussion in Abuja and at the online one. The conversation has
started and Nigerians are very much alert to what constitutes a hate
speech or message and what does not. That we can even have these
conversations is a sign our democracy is learning to pay attention to
what we would probably consider trivial in years past.
The enthusiasm of young Nigerians
towards the 2015 elections is unprecedented. Not only are they willing
to vote, a lot of them have joined the campaign teams of the major
presidential and governorship candidates. These young people are in
their own rights top-notch professionals and business executives but
they have decided this time is about politics and the leadership of
Nigeria. Ideas like fact-checking information on candidates, getting the
general populace to commit to vote and decide for their candidates, and
getting the general public to their PVCs amongst others have been
initiated by young people. They have come short at other times – e.g.
the reported unruly behaviour of some of them at the Transcorp Hilton
event organised to debate the issues in the elections comes to mind.
That shows that again we are not where we ought to be but we are
definitely in a much better place.
How do we decide who to vote for? We
either decide rationally, irrationally or have a mix of both. Those who
decide irrationally are likely to vote for a candidate because they
share their religion, or because they are from their own ethnic group.
Americans once voted a Warren Harding as president because he was
handsome; so, irrationality will always guide some voters. There are
other irrational positions like, “He is dark and his voice is sexy;”
“She has a beautiful daughter”; “We share the same first name” amongst
others. It will sound rational to them but none has been proved to make a
president do better in office. It would help to separate the issues
from propaganda. You must look out for the candidate that emphasises the
need to focus on the Nigerian economy, national security, corruption,
and education. There are other challenges but these are the critical
ones at this time. Any candidate who shies away from campaigning around
these issues does not deserve your vote. Watch out for fictitious
organisations looking to distract Nigerians from what the issues are
with adverts that border on mudslinging and even libel at times. That is
not why we are here.
Finally, it is our responsibility as
Nigerians to ensure the elections are peaceful. We cannot afford to let
the world get proved right that we cannot organise peaceful, free and
fair elections. It should be stated clearly that a lot of observers
around the world expect the 2015 elections to be bloody, the onus is on
us Nigerians to key into our national pride and heritage and prove these
folk wrong. If politicians who battle so hard on the campaign front can
hug and laugh with one another during and after the campaign, we the
people must not make ourselves the collateral damage for their ambition.
May God prosper Nigeria.
(c) Japheth J. Omojuwa
Credit: Omojuwa
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