Asking politicians who are campaigning for electoral offices in 2019 to state their political ideologies may frighten them. Legend says that wearing a beard in First Republic Nigeria disqualified applicants from getting jobs in the Federal Civil Service of the government of Prime Minister Abubakar Tafawa Balewa. A beard marked you as a communist!
This happened towards the mid-term of the Cold War between capitalist North Atlantic Treaty Organisation nations, led by America, and the Warsaw Pact nations led by the Soviet Union. The pro-West and ultra-conservative government of Tafawa Balewa was visibly frightened by anyone with any hue of Red.
The first Premier of Western Nigeria, Obafemi Awolowo, and Leader of the left of centre Action Group political party, read the mood of the nation, as he declared, “In the circumstances of Nigeria, it would be reckless, and lead to economic chaos, to adopt a rigid socialist policy, or drink the cup of undiluted capitalism.”
The way Nigerian politicians bob in and out of political parties makes you wonder what they plan to accomplish in office. This confusion may have compelled the electorate that have no guarantee of what dividend of democracy they’d get, to insist on gratification before voting.
To be sure, politicians of the more politically mature nations change political parties. But it is usually due to conviction, upon discovery of new information or political perspective. And when they do, they stick to their new doctrines.
Winston Churchill, who later became Prime Minister of Britain as a member of the Conservative Party, started out from the Liberal Party. President Ronald Reagan was a member of the Democratic Party, before becoming an ideologue of the Grand Old Party, America’s Republican Party.
The stock vote-catching devices set by Nigerian politicians are “see and buy,” or doling of little sums to poverty-stricken constituents; “Ghana-must-go” pay-offs to big political stalwarts; sharing “stomach infrastructure” freebies; and dispensing sinecures to party faithful.
Political theorists suggest that political, economic, or ethical ideology makes it easier to hold the politicians and their political parties accountable to their words as obtains in more mature democracies. This reasoning probably originates from Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s theory of the social contract between leaders and citizens.
The revelation from former Cross River State Governor Donald Duke, that Nigerian political parties are no more than makeshift platforms that Nigerian politicians only use to clamber to elective, or appointive, posts, and are therefore dispensable, is proving to be true indeed.
The half-hearted attempt of Nigeria’s constitution to whip Nigerian politicians into some kind of ideological line is in Sections 65(a)(b); 106(d); 13(c); and 177(c), which provide that “A person shall be qualified for election if he is a member of a political party, and is sponsored by that party.”
The constitution seems to assume that the manifesto, which is no more than a cocktail of activities, should be sufficient as the underlying ideological direction of a political party. Nothing is farther from the truth. As someone has truthfully observed, you cannot pour out water from an empty glass.
In some nations, those who seek high political positions, like President, Prime Minister, or Governor, would have written a book that explains their ideological beliefs, and provide details of what they would do when they get elected.
This is one sure way to hold politicians to certain ethical credos. As ideologies go, you must notice a thread of continuity in the life of a politician, whose politics is consistently undergirded by a corpus of beliefs, especially if they are formally articulated.
If you read the writings of Vladmir Lenin, the ideologue of the Soviet Union’s socialist politics, you will have no doubt that his opinions are practically opposite to the sentiments of, say William F. Buckley, Jr., that liberals could describe as rabid American arch-conservative.
One dictionary defines ideology as “A body of ideas, usually political, and or economic, forming the basis of a national or sectarian policy.” The two major ideologies are capitalism and socialism, except for communism, the variant of socialism practised by China.
Capitalism is an economic and political system where a nation’s trade and industry are operated by private owners– for private gains-though regulated and taxed by the state. Socialism prefers that a nation’s means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned, and operated by the state.
Wherever capitalism or socialism is practised, the politicians focus on the project of governance, though they differ in their fundamental beliefs. Ideologies whip politicians and their political parties into line, and serve as barometers for measuring their successes or failures.
Awolowo observed: “If any group of people fails to agree to basic principles, and as to the methods to be adopted in applying these principles, it is impossible for them to work within the same fold, and to submit themselves to party loyalty and discipline.”
He asserts: “I, and most of my colleagues, are democrats in nature, and socialists by conviction.” He adds that the Action Group believes “In the democratic way of life: equality under the law, respect for fundamental human rights…; and the existence of independent and impartial tribunals where those rights can be enforced.”
Thus, the manifesto garment woven out of this ideological cloth, summarised in the slogan, “Freedom for All, Life more Abundant,” included “Freedom from British rule; Freedom from ignorance; Freedom from disease; and Freedom from want.”
And the plan to achieve this was in “The immediate termination of British rule…; the education of all children… and illiterate adults; the provision of health and general welfare; and the total abolition of want in our society by means of any economic policy, which is both expedient and effective.”
A stated ideology enables individuals and economic entities to determine if the government would be raising taxes for Big Government; committing more spend into social programmes, like healthcare delivery; or if economic infrastructure, like telecommunications, would be run by private interests, the state, or both.
Such information can assist foreign direct investors to plan whether to put their money in long-term, or short-term, investments, or not at all. Clearly articulated ideologies also enable the opposition political parties to determine their points of departure from the ruling political party.
If Nigerian politicians are uncomfortable with classic ideological labels, like capitalism, socialism, and their variants, they could adopt the Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy in Chapter Two of the Nigerian Constitution.
But Chapter Two is “nudum pactum,” a contract or agreement that is unenforceable. The ouster clause in Section 6(6)(c) of the Constitution slyly says government cannot be compelled to abide by all the provisions of Chapter Two!
Political parties with ideologies last longer. Though the Awolowo-led AG, and its successor Unity Party of Nigeria, have suffered the vicissitude of being banned by military fiat, its well-thought-out and strongly articulated ideology and programmes still endure in Nigeria.
You can see the atavistic reminders of the AG in the pretender-progressive political parties of the Third Republic; from the Social Democratic Party resurrected from the would-have-been Third Republic under military dictator Ibrahim Babangida, Alliance for Democracy, Action Congress of Nigeria, and its successor All Progressives Congress.
Even political charlatans, who don the “Awo cap,” to make political hay with especially the South-West electorate have somewhat successfully launched into Nigeria’s political deep.
Twitter @lekansote1
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