Okenyi Kenechi
In two months time, Nigeria will be engrossed in yet another round of elections. The every 4-year ritual has actually not helped the country in her quest to elevate herself from the depth it was plunged to as a result of decades of misrule by the military and their civilian accomplices.
Yet, every four years, billions are spent by the nation’s electoral umpire, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, in the conduct of elections that will ensure that the people complain for another four years when the political class lines them up again for another election.
I usually refer to such as the Tyranny of the minority; the less than 1 million people who decide for over 180 million others on how they should live their lives.
The political class, month to every general election, divides itself into two opposing camps and throw unsolicited tantrums at each other. It is actually a game to them, played at the expense of millions of all of us.
The very concept of political parties in Nigeria is anchored on how much sentimental one could be. It has little or nothing to do with ideological leanings which drive political parties in the rest of the world.
In Nigeria, the two political parties, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP and the All Progressives Congress, APC, are two sides of one coin. People decamp and defect or as the case may be, float new political parties at will. The ultimate goal is to win elections and nothing else.
I think it was Chinua Achebe’s There was a Country that I read him lament the lack of preparedness on the part of the Nigerian people when Britain was about handing over the mantle of leadership to Nigerians. The people have been conditioned to accept anything thrown at them.
The leaders of that era did not prepare the people for the long tortures journey that we are on. If they did, not just by reorientation but through the inculcation of national values in the minds of the people, proper education and other forms of national awareness, Nigeria wouldn’t have been the sorry sight that she is right now where nothing works.
I mean, it will take an unprepared people to think they can pray their way out of bad leadership or that elections without strong institutions will cure the many ills bedeviling the country. Not in Rome, Jerusalem or mecca do they pray daily for the repentance of bad politicians. They simply ensure that the system is of the best practices and vote out bad leaders, except, perhaps, Saudi Arabia that is governed by a monarchy.
National development is work anchored on citizens’ vigilance and much of the work is in the public mounting pressure on the political class.
I have not seen anything that has forced Nigerians to take to the streets to demand a change of policies or that government do things better but I have seen Nigerians run berserk over religious issues. And please, don’t tell me about the 2012 fuel subsidy protest. We know that it was heavily politicized. That’s why the same people who occupied the streets then became lame overnight when a new government increased pump prices.
But I have seen people protest and kill over mundane religious issues like the drawing of prophet Mohammed in faraway Denmark.
I have also seen people killed because they desecrated the prophet etc. Nigerians are more interested in the metaphysical rather than reality. So, while the politicians stole, they simply urged the people to pray. But in a working country, there will be no room for idleness that ensures people sit in religious houses during working hours and wait for miracles.
The Nigerian leaders before independence did not prepare the people for patriotism neither were the people prepared to hold government accountable. The leaders of those years were simply too excited about the fact that they were about to step into offices left by the colonial Britain and forgot to do their homework. 5 decades after, Nigeria has not recovered.
Take the Nigerian 1999 constitution for instance. That constitution has ensured that Nigeria sits at a place without making any progress, yet there has been no mass action to have the Constitution amended or even trashed.
Like I always posited, our problem is not corruption but lack of knowledge of what a good society is. All these cacophony about corruption is only scratching the surface of a much deeper crisis. That is why when the militiricians unveiled the 1999 constitution, the people did not react in a way that will ensure their inputs are accepted.
Almost 20 years of consistent civilian rule, new set of dictators are in charge of the country and have ensured the inequality continue to grow just as low life expectancy and joblessness.
Elections will not solve our problems due to the fact that they are being conducted on a faulty foundation. The demand for a constitutional review is what is needed instead of another round of expensive elections where the electoral umpire INEC is in the pockets of the president.
It is like a player refereeing a game he is part of.
