Our socio political existence has been profoundly established
to be inherently tied to elections and re-elections. Nigerian politics and by
extension Nigerian politicians live by elections, for elections and die by
elections. The essence of politics in other nations of the world seem lost within our national frontiers and
this might reasonably explain the near comatose state of our national
development. This primitive precondition has numbed our senses so disturbingly
that I wonder if any chance remains for us to effectively demand an inseparable
tie between politics and national development.
The Dubais and Abu Dhabis of this world could have been just
another Nigeria. They however did not have the misfortune of leaders without
capacity to look to the future or the sense of deliberately designing a
national vision to run with. We could have decided for instance, since the
discovery of oil in commercial quantities in the 60s to be the most developed
country in Africa but no, we were satisfied with tactical little wins - one
year victories without a care about the wonderful prospects of a purposely
created future. Time has proven without fail, the unchallenged truth that without
a will, there is usually not a way. Many so called visionary plans were mere
academic and socio economic parties organized by past governments to divert and
distract attention from gross incompetence and manifest display of ignorance of
the universal objectives of leadership. The family of Bin Fayed practically
redefined the fortunes of the UAE which today ranks as one of the world’s
hotspots for commerce and tourism. It took a conscious, deliberate and
collective resolve to determine to establish a Kingdom that would have the
whole world streaming to it. Nigerian governments look at pockets of scattered
development without a holistic approach that is more enduring and in the greater
interest of the nation.
The world over, everything has a price. From roads to
medical facilities, shelter to energy and even security and intelligence, at the
right price, anybody or government can almost get what they want and desire. I
have often questioned if the lack of the financial means accounts for the very
poor state of our national facilities and infrastructure. I usually have been
tempted to assume so but the news media fail to help that line of reasoning.
Why can we not have the best in and of the world as a nation despite known
facts that we have 20Billion dollars available on a yearly basis for private
profit sharing?
It has to now become a prayer for every well-meaning
Nigerian to ask God for leadership that goes beyond politics. Truth be told,
state or regional policing might have been a more effective approach towards
curbing g the mind boggling satanism that insurgents across the country
perpetrate. We however have not been collectively governed by a true national leader;
we have been broken down into clans, tribes, groups and kith and given varying
treatments depending on the whims and caprice of whomever it was that held
power. If we had the fortune of being groomed collectively, served collectively
and punished collectively, perhaps as a people we might have matured now. It is
this state of unsettling divisions in our collective mentality that makes it so
hard for us to demand accountability from people whom we supposedly elected
into offices. The usually self-serving divisions often employed by a certain
political class would have been roundly defeated if we were first united and if
we had selfless leadership. We lose the advantage of unity because our leaders
from their inauguration become obsessed with re-election and therefore
sacrifice the requirement for meeting leadership objectives on individual
altars depending on how much such an individual controls in the political
scheme of things and how much he or she has potential of contributing to a re-election.
Religion and ethnicity have often been basis for internal
wrangling among the led in Nigeria. This puts them to a disadvantage in the
face of real physical developmental challenges. The Northern led and the
Southern led must come to a consensus of opinion on their suffering and agree
to tackle it head on, united and focused on improving their lot. Or else, we become
faced again with another re-election monger….
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