As Nigerians wait with bated breath for the rescheduled election on Saturday after the cancellation of what would have been decision day for the next president and our national legislators, the fear of the ability of Independent Electoral Commission (INEC) to deliver credible polls is palpable. INEC chairman Prof. Mahmood Yakubu had attributed the postponement of the election to logistics and operational challenges.
Nigerians, who had waited for four years for this, went to bed on Friday only to wake on Saturday to be told that the elections have been rescheduled. By the new arrangement, while that of the President and National Assembly would now take place on Saturday, February 23, that of the governorship and house of assembly would now come up on March 9. If we have waited for four years, waiting one week more would not kill us. But certainly, this is a sad commentary for INEC and it has to double its effort to allay the fears of Nigerians and concerned international observers on their ability to deliver on this. Our votes must count.
If there is any singular reason responsible for our backwardness as a nation, it is clearly the problem of poor leadership. Agreed that a nation gets the kind of leadership it deserves; it is without doubt, the responsibility of the leaders to show the followers the way to go. For as long as we have continued to fail in fixing the problem of leadership, we would continue to grope in the dark for a long time. The truth is that our leadership has remained pedestrian.
Whereas the expectations of the society on the standard expected of the people have continued to go up, that of the leadership has continued to diminish. There is this post I saw on the social media that I think is very instructive as it concerns leadership in the country. In that post, the person queried why the best university degrees and expectations are required for a man seeking even a security job, while all it requires to be president of Nigeria remains evidence of attempted school certificate.
The 2019 polls have given us yet another opportunity to ask critical questions. My hope is that Nigerians take advantage of this opportunity to shape our collective destiny as a nation. Many of the challenges plaguing us as a nation are attributable to the fact that we have simply not risen above the level of our leadership. We have been held back by the shackles of tribalism, nepotism, shameless and primitive pursuit of self-aggrandizement, poverty etc. For us religion has remained an albatross, such that in our pursuit of religiosity, we have left behind our spirituality and humanity.
I have often argued that Nigeria is one of the easiest countries to govern. Many of the problems that confront us today have torn apart many other societies. How we have managed to overcome these and weathered the storms is what I do not know. But what I do know is that all that the average Nigerian needs from his government is food on his table, job opportunities and other basic needs and he will not bother where the president is from or what religion he professes. This, more than anything else, was the lesson of the aborted June 12, 1993 election of the late Chief M. K. O. Abiola and his running mate, Babagana Kingibe. Every Nigerian of voting age was aware that they were both Muslims, yet the pattern of the votes across the nation stunned bookmakers. Ndigbo knew that their son Dr. Sylvester Ugoh was the running mate of Alhaji Bashir Tofa, of the National Republican Convention (NRC), yet they voted for Abiola’s Social Democratic Party (SDP).
Now, we have five days more to think through who our choice as president would be. This choice must be made without sentiments and must be made knowing that we will have to live with our choice, good or bad, for the next four years. Whoever that may be, we will discover sooner than later. However, the interest of Nigerians now is what they expect from that person. For too long we have emphasised mundane things that do not add value or help the course of our national cohesion. We have pursued those things that tend to divide us more than those that should unite us.
The issues before the next leader have not changed. The demand of the people remains solution to the perennial problem of insecurity, increasing rate of poverty, corruption and economic growth etc. The nation has been held down for too long, so much so that we have remained a disappointment not only to ourselves but as well as other neighbouring and African nations who have been looking up to us for leadership.
The immediate assignment of the president would be to address the security concerns of the nation; to quell banditry and unrestrained killings and calm agitations, suspicions over unequal treatment of Nigerians. There cannot be prosperity in a volatile environment. No investor would risk his investment in an unpredictable economy. This will in turn deprive the people of jobs and business opportunities. We can’t be doing things in the old order and be expecting different results. We have allowed religion and ethnicity to taint every segment of our national life. Addressing the problems posed by insurgency, militancy of any form would require a dispassionate approach; an approach that sees these infractions as threat to the nation and deal with it appropriately. If the Independent People of Biafria (IPOB) is threat to Nigeria, then the killer Fulani herdsmen are greater threats . If IPOB is branded a terrorist group, then it goes without saying that killer herders are greater terrorists. Anything short of that will never bring about the desired national cohesion and reduction in insurgency.
In 2018, Nigeria overtook India as the nation with the highest number of extremely poor people. According a report by Brookings Institution, India used to hold the position with a population of 1.324 billion people as against Nigeria’s 200 million.
The number of Nigerians in extreme poverty, according to the report, increases by six people every minute. “According to our projections, Nigeria has already overtaken India as the country with the largest number of extremely poor in early 2018, and the Democratic Republic of Congo could soon take over the number two spot.
“At the end of May 2018, our trajectories suggest that Nigeria had about 87 million people in extreme poverty, compared with India’s 73 million. What is more, extreme poverty in Nigeria is growing by six people every minute, while poverty in India continues to fall.
“In fact, by the end of 2018 in Africa as a whole, there will probably be about 3.2 million more people living in extreme poverty than there is today. “Africans account for about two-thirds of the world’s extreme poor and that if current trends persist, Africa will account for nine-tenths by 2030.
“Fourteen out of 18 countries in the world, where the number of extreme poor is rising—are in Africa.” In March, the International Monetary Fund had said Nigerians are getting poorer saying there is a need for coherent and comprehensive economic reforms.”
Whereas our leaders divide us along ethnic and religious lines, poverty does not recognise those schisms. A hungry man is an angry man. Hunger does not distinguish between tribe, tongue and religion. Nigerians must eat to reduce the agitations and anger in the land. This is not a matter of political party affiliation or religious leanings. There is no room for blame game anymore. We have to device a means of feeding our people. It is not rocket science, it require meticulousness and commitment to achieve.
Corruption continues to threaten the nation. We have had enough mantra on the fight against corruption by successive governments. The task before the would-be president would be to strengthen democratic and other institutions so that they can perform on their own, independently. The fight against corruption must be total and not one that tends to pander to the whims and caprices of political office holders, especially the president, against the ordinary man.
Finally, and not the least of the demands of the people would be the creation of jobs. There are several of our youths wandering the streets aimlessly. Many have given their souls to gaming and all forms of gambling. And wherever there is gambling, drug abuse and other forms of social vices are next door neighbours. If indeed the youths are our future, then the time to address the danger that lies ahead of us as a nation is now. These issues, amongst others, are some of the problems that demand immediate attention of the president. It is not a matter of which political party wins or which is in the opposition, if it will require the president to get the best hands from the opposition party to fix the problems, so be it. It is in the final interest and benefit of the nation and that is all that matters.
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