Campaign is serious business

Last Friday, the commercial city of Onitsha played host to the presidential candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr Peter Obi. He was there to flag off his campaigns for the 2027 presidential race. While there, Obi did not just mount the podium to speak, he had a message to deliver. It is evident from what he eventually rolled out that he came prepared. He was armed with an agenda, a blueprint on how to make Nigeria work. It was not a trifle. There was no playing to the gallery. It was a serious engagement through and through. That shows that the task that he set out to undertake is a serious one. He did not paper over any issue. He brought flesh and blood to bear on all of them.

But where is Obi coming from? Nigerians who are still alert will recall that he treaded this path in the past. Four years ago, he unleashed a momentum that had never been seen in the Nigerian political arena. His coming was like a new dawn. It was fresh and refreshing. Then, Obi introduced verve and vibrancy to presidential campaigns. He was as passionate then as he is now. When he first stepped out four years ago, the greater majority of Nigerians were just getting to know the real stuff that he was made of. Quite a good number of them had encountered him in the public arena, one way or another. But none of them was able to associate him with the kind and level of intellectual depth that he exhibited. His message resonated with the people. It was not made of familiar stuff. It was out of the ordinary. No platitudes. His presentations were loaded with substance – an uncommon variety of it for that matter. His message, in all its ramifications, sounded refreshingly different. It was no make-belief. And Nigerians bought into it substantially.

Then, if there was anything that proved to the world that Nigerians connected with the Peter Obi message, it was the outcome of the election. Obi coasted home to victory. The results, barring manipulations, indicated that he won the presidential election. But we are all witnesses to how enemies of the people thwarted their will and imposed on them an order they did not ask for. What happened in 2023, including the rape of justice that their lordships inflicted on the country, now belongs to history. But Nigeria is on the march again. The people may have been bruised by the regrettable events of 2023 but they are not battered. They remain resilient. And Peter Obi, the man whose victory was snatched, is still determined. His spirit was not dampened by the malfeasance that characterized that year’s election. He is gearing up to spring another surprise.

Interestingly, Obi does not take the Nigerian voter for granted. If he were the casual type, he would not have taken time to outline his agenda for Nigeria. Such an exercise would have looked boring to him, having done so in the past. But he decided, instead, to step out afresh as if he had not passed through that route before. He is not assuming or presuming anything. Before the other top contenders step forward to present their agenda, Nigerians must remind themselves of where they are today. In doing this, one question is often being asked: are Nigerians better off than they were four years ago? A dispassionate answer to this question is what will guide Nigerians as they navigate towards 2027. Nigerians must remind themselves of the relative ease with which they went about their daily lives before the advent of the Bola Tinubu presidency. Once they do that, the burning furnace that Nigeria has become will come alive. The voyage that the people were forced into a little over three years ago is snuffing life out of them. They yearn for an end to this hellish state.

The present order in Nigeria presents us with a facade. It came with all its pretentiousness. It all started with something they called economic reforms. Because the man at the head of the voodoo did not spare a thought for Nigerians as he planned to grab power, he dived headlong into the fuel subsidy brouhaha. The issue of appropriate pricing of petroleum products has been with us for decades. Many governments that came in the past gave consideration to the matter and decided on the best approach to adopt. But this present government heedlessly plunged into it and has, expectedly, not been able to weather the storm till now. That singular misadventure is at the root of the suffering that has crippled the people. Much more regrettable is the fact that government is caught in a quandary. It does not know how to get out of the mess. In the absence of any clue that could work, the drivers of the government have decided to be talking as if the rest of the people are fools. They tell us that the economic reforms are working and that Nigerians are gradually reaping the gains. This is better told to the marines. But it is gratifying that Peter Obi, while presenting his agenda last week, noted that economic reforms without better livelihoods is bunkum. It is a fraud.

I am further constrained to make reference to Peter Obi’s agenda owing to the salient points that his campaign speech highlighted. Obi came up with what I have decided to christen the “C Quintet”, namely, capacity, competence, compassion, character and commitment. He is advocating that the 2027 campaigns should be guided by these factors. I can understand what he is saying here. In fact, it is easy for Nigerians to connect with these imperatives. This becomes a lot easier if we bring the present administration into the mix. If we do, we will readily agree that these indices are clearly absent in the governance of the country under President Tinubu. Nigerians have played unwilling host to lack of capacity. They have seen incompetence walking on all fours. Character is a strange bedfellow to the present order. And you will be hitting the nail on the head if you say that compassion and commitment have no place in this present state of chaos.

Why has Peter Obi made these indices an issue in governance? Simple. You have to be competent to govern otherwise the house you forced yourself into will fall on your head as it is the case in Nigeria of today. We need not emphasize the fact that a leader must have character. In fact, any person without character is a pollutant. He can unleash an epidemic on his environment. I need not analyze these one after another. The bottomline is that where these indices are present, governance, definitely, will stand on a firm footing. So far, we have not been insisting on some irreducible minimums that governance demands. And that explains our unfortunate romance with bad leadership. The time has come for reset. Let us begin this journey to the realization of a new Nigeria by recognizing that campaign, the precursor to choosing who leads the country, is serious business. Those involved must not trifle with it.