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One used to think, while People’s Democratic Party (PDP) held sway at the centre, that its powerbrokers and holders flaunted too much impunity. Between 1999 and 2007, raw, naked presidential power was at play over oil rights for the Niger Delta as well as in the governorship ballot of Rivers and Anambra states. The party, state governors and local government chairmen, on too many occasions, acted so unilaterally one thought the country belonged to another age or planet, or both. However, from 2015 when All Progressives Congress (APC) became the national so-called governing party, one began to see enough power insanities to understand that all of PDP’s missteps put together were only child’s play.
One is not joking. The way the Buhari-Tinubu political party doubles down every time Nigerians cry out against one government policy or the other gives goose pimples. The way the national government toys with or looks away from the constantly increasing cost of living, nationwide is a case study. Compare and contrast the cost of electricity unit, food items and petroleum products, then and now.
Not to blame the party for all of our country’s economic, political and social woes, since these are only part of current global phenomena, but what verifiable commensurate efforts are in the public space by this and the previous APC presidency? Perhaps, my PDP bias has not and will not let me see or say them. Here is an open challenge for the party or any of its officials or members to step out and showcase the report card of its eleven years hitherto in power. Nigerians and the world are quite interested in these particular bragging rights so, APC, over to you.
Because, as someone desperate for all-round excellence, this writer is a stickler for better living for our people. Life is a waste if you do not live well. In fact, methinks life not well lived is death before death. Which explains why any government or political party that plays down on welfare of the people has already failed -for me.
Unfortunately, the way I see it, APC seems to pay scant attention to the masses. I hope and pray it is just my PDPishness that makes me say this. I hope and pray that APC (of 2015 to 2027) is better than PDP (of 1999 to 2015). I hope and pray our people have performed better now than then.
Alas, my mind cannot stop seesawing in favour of PDP. It is true that the party recorded many entries of silliness, all right, but it is truer on the other hand that it also boasted of much more people-centricity. There was something about PDP that APC seems to lack. Exactly what though, I cannot tell.
In a totally different context, we may wish to also look at how PDP tried to deal with corruption. I say “tried to deal” because far more ought to have been done. Yet, it must be said, President Olusegun Obasanjo (1999 to 2007) was somewhat businesslike, surefooted and unmistakable in fighting corruption. Under him, PDP brought many corrupt PDP members occupying top echelons of government, across all strata, to book. Flip the page and all you see since 2015 are feeble ad hoc attempts by APC, a party that only remembers your corruption foul once you crosstitute out.
APC must come clean, on this count. Nigerians want to see APC members, old and new, who dipped their hands in the public till, being not only prosecuted but also jailed once found guilty. The current mannerism of selective prosecution is a crying shame. Pray, the very idea of pursuing former Attorney General Abubakar Malami, and former Governor Nasir el-Rufai, only after they replaced the “P” in APC with “D” as their new political base is both laughable and puerile. President Bola Tinubu can and should do more, for the sake of posterity.
Furthermore, PDP of old was shameless but careful how it pushed to make Nigeria one-party state. I thought our party showed no leadership, no patriotism the way it used its sheer weight to lure over members of other political parties. On live radio and television and in my writings, I called out the party not once, not twice, over the years. Then, APC happened and, my, my, my!
To be fair, I think the original APC showed some restraint in this matter. It only lost its innocence when the same people who had messed up PDP crosstituted thereto. From then on, things have been on a free fall. Today, even an unborn child knows there is no hiding the fact that apart from 2027, the only other aspiration or yearning of APC is one-party statehood.
Still, it is not too late for the party to help itself and indeed this country by retracing its steps. Rabidly forcing everybody under one political umbrella is Neanderthal. Not even the military that we thought was known for forcefully having its way succeeded in this ambition. So, APC shall fail.
Enter the cost of election forms by the party. Gawd, how did we get here? The political party running a country rocked by alarming poverty is asking its members to cough out 200 million Naira to run for president; 150 for governor, 100 for senate, 70 for house of representatives and 20 for house of assembly. When I first read it, I was too dazed to believe or react or think.
Already Nigerians have risen in unison to bark against the unplayable form fees. What message is the party sending? That the political offices are for sale and therefore for the highest bidder? Or that the offices are so lucrative?
You buy a form worth tens of millions of Naira to go and do what? To go and render service? Or to go and talk down on your compatriots, how you are not their receptionist? Or, to go and steal the country blind?
Fortunately, I think, I overheard just as I was rounding off this entry that the party’s national publicity secretary had come out to say the humongous figures are the handiwork of mischief makers. It had better be so. Otherwise, APC should be ready to pay for locking out its genuine members from representing it. Exorbitant election form fees can hurt the party -any party- in ways it may never understand.
Inclusion, not exclusion, is what Nigeria needs for 2027. The poor should be allowed to breathe. The poor should be accorded the basic human rights honour of access to participation in election either to vote or be voted for, as granted by the constitution. Anything different shall not only be anti-democracy and antisocial but also criminally primitive and anti-life: God forbid.
APC must not deceive itself that Nigerians shall always be this docile. You cannot be looking for second term but insult, maltreat, and overtax the same people who should give you that. Even patience has limits. Foolishness and daredevilry too should.
God bless Nigeria!
