As far as the forthcoming 2023 polls exercise is concerned, last week marked the actual take-off of the jostle for political power among the various candidates representing their respective political parties, with the formal approval of electioneering campaigns by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
The race is therefore officially now open at least for the elections in respect of the President and members of the National Assembly, while the contest for state governors and members of state assemblies will be from October 12, 2022. In the same vein, the start-up protocols for the various parties have featured different strokes for each of them, just as it is for rousing up sleeping giants. Also to be expected is the wide variety of campaign messages which will ranging across the good, bad and even ugly spins. Undoubtedly too, while some of such will aim at putting the issues of concern in public view, while others may simply be directed at cutting opponents to size.
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It is therefore for good measure that at least two factors intended for promoting decorum and mitigating excesses during the campaign season are in place. The first is the complement of guidelines by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), through the Electoral Act 2022. The second is the General Abdulsalami Abubakar led National Peace Committee (NPC), which last week, succeeded in bringing presidential candidates of political parties to sign a peace accord in Abuja. It is widely believed that the NPC has since its inception in 2015, played a commendable role in fostering relative peace in the country’s electoral culture by making political party leaders commit to promoting peace among their followers. And as President Muhamadu Buhari himself admitted when he met with the members of the NPC last week, his electoral victory in 2015 was largely facilitated by the committee. The onus rests on the various parties to comply with the designated guidelines and needful conduct.
It is also instructive that the NPC has called for issues based campaigns for the 2023 polls. Seen in context this advocacy by the NPC should serve as a national mantra for the polls exercise. To contemplate otherwise constitutes a disservice to the country. It is also timeous that the forthcoming polls exercise coincides with when the country is beset unprecedentedly with a bagful of existential threats – each posing significant potency to undermine her. While an exhaustive mention of them may be constrained by space, the most glaring ones include the runaway state of insecurity, unprecedented scale of criminality, widespread poverty and economic despair, widening divisions among the various ethnic nationalities in the country and general bad governance across the tiers of government. Given that these tendencies are so prevalent and affect every living Nigerian, there is no shortage of issues to build credible campaign enterprises around.
However, given the desperation with which electoral exercises are prosecuted in Nigeria it will not be off the cards to expect breaches of the rules of the game featuring copiously, given the characteristics of our politicians whose disregard for law and order is second nature. Who knows if in the 16th century when Englishman John Lyly penned the immortal line that “all is fair in war and love”, he had the Nigerian politician in mind? For politics for the Nigerian and African politician is an enterprise that brooks no moral continence. It is a ‘do’ and if possible, ‘die’ affair. What matters to the typical politician is how much material gain he or she can corner from the common patrimony. And this mindless, buccaneering tendency is what has kept the country in its endless state of arrested development.
Hence the desired thrust of the electioneering campaigns is to proffer sustainable solutions that will change the country’s narrative from the killing field it is for now, to a new level of restoring its nationhood. Nigerians want to hear how and when restoration will dawn through the inception of good governance in verifiable terms. This is no time for parroting of empty promises based on historical claims and entitlement mentality. Courtesy of the Constitution, every Nigerian is eligible to occupy any political office in the land once the requisite qualifications are procured. What matters is who can stop the drift of the country and foster a turn around. It is time to speak up through any means especially the trending advantages of the social media. For marginalized interests such as the minorities – Niger Delta region especially, this is the season to state your terms to any candidate who wants your votes.
Meanwhile the preliminary steps in the campaign launches by the various parties – especially the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), are featuring some twists and turns of interest, which they need to resolve early in the day, as the forthcoming polls will manifest unprecedented tendencies that may surprise even the most intrepid political pundit. This is courtesy of the yet uncharted procedures that will be deployed under the aegis of the new Electoral Act 2022. Considering that the implementation of some of its provisions that pertain to the preliminary stages of the electoral exercise have ushered in several untold changes, it can be imagined what its full play-out will do to our electoral culture. In any case, the 2023 polls exercise remains the first testing ground for the new Act, hence still offers significant lessons on the new legislation.
With respect to the campaign hitches of the parties, the APC campaign launch suffered a slight hiccup courtesy of its postponement due to the absence of its Presidential candidate Bola Tinubu, and protests over size and membership of its Campaign Committee. Coming to the PDP, its problems are akin to the scenario in a house of commotion and possible implosion as the turbulence that arose over the loss of both tickets for the Presidency and Vice Presidency by Rivers State Governor Ezebunwo Nyesom Wike, is yet to abate. From the look of things, the earlier it resolves the Wike factor, the better its chances in the coming polls.
On a final note, the foregoing internal issues and other challenges of the political parties notwithstanding, what Nigerians want now is a campaign season that offers them something credible to look up to. And the parties as well as candidates should better be guided by this consideration.
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