The biggest tragedy to befall Nigeria is the transmutation of public office from service to a private enterprise. It is at the centre of Nigeria’s backwardness. It is responsible for the country’s underdevelopment.
It has denied the country of the power of the state to direct or mobilise resources to tackle social and economic problems and give citizens a sense of belonging and value. It gave birth to or reinforced poverty in Nigeria because when political moguls and their agents take over public institutions, they waste no time in executing their strategies for recovering their investments as well as expected return, thus conflicting expectation that they would work towards delivering on manifestoes in the interest of the citizens.
So, rather than executing relevant agenda for actions that have social impact and multiplier effects, candidates for such elective offices would draft business plans using their tenures and resources of the state at their command as bankable projects, with known cashflow streams.
Nigerian politicians, many of who would do anything to win elections, easily find financiers who are equally ready to fund elections as profitable ventures. Such financiers are ready to bankroll an individual and help him or her to win an election. And with money flowing freely with some money bags in society, there are always willing and ready financiers who are quick to enter into partnerships with such political contractors masquerading as leaders.
But the financiers are clearly not Santa or Good Samaritans. It is certainly not necessarily for the good of the state that they are backing that contestant for the elective post, whether at the local government, state, or even national level. They are opportunistic, businessmen out to make the most of society. Whether written or not, the understanding and agreements are clear that the financiers would be compensated.
So this begs the question of who pays the cost, as the financiers dish out the greek gifts, which are as good as loans. Certainly, it is not the politician who gets his fat budget bankrolled by one or few money bags, popularly seen to be the godfathers. It’s obviously the people, his constituents whose interests he has assumed office to protect, that eventually bear the burden of his political project.
With all the talk about godfathers and other interest groups that straddle our political landscape, it is the abandoned projects that litter the states that the people get in return for sending someone to occupy a certain position on their behalf.
As a result, what the average Nigerian is left with as his or her benefit from voting for these candidates is the opportunity cost of their political choices. They are left to bear the consequence of the actions of their politicians who, even before they assume office have packaged the cash flows from the state’s revenues and sold them to savvy investors.
Thus, for as long as such a leader is in charge, the prospect of the state or local government council shows no sign of change or improvement. The investors know what is coming into the state’s coffers at any point in time and what is due to them, based on the supposed post-dated checks they are armed with.
The people bear the cost in terms of the opportunity cost, that is, the forgone alternative, which is the development that never comes to their village or town. They voted for improvement in their standard of living, but that never comes because the resources that could have caused that change had been hijacked.
The benefits they get from such a political structure is the gulley that continued to widen until it cut the road into two, cutting one part of the state from the other. They pay the interest on such political investments through the widening gap between the rich and the poor- who unfortunately get poorer while the politician and his financier are getting richer.
Even the political parties seem to be structured in such a way to entrench this. Otherwise, why would it cost so much to even get nominated for a post on the platform of a political party? Why would a contender for a post be made to part with N10 million for the form for that post and as much as N2 million for “expression of interest” for the same post? Another, for the lower electoral post, has to pay N4.5 million for the form and N500,000 for the “expression of interest” for the post, making the cost of nomination a barrier for the poor or an average Nigerian, who are perhaps patriotic.
One report said that the 2015 presidential election cost Nigeria as much as N3.23 billion in adverts alone. That’s why it’s no longer a surprise that it costs so much for someone to get elected into a political office. We read and hear of billions being spent on elections by politicians and one wonders who pays the bill.
The financiers and their political borrowers make the financing costs the first line of charge on the public funds, denying the people of the infrastructure and social projects. This explains the absence or near-absence of true government for the people.
Interestingly, one wonders how they spend these billions on elections. Is it really the media houses that are these expensive or the posters that are printed? Is it the cash that some of them use to buy votes or the bread and onions they share? Or are there some hidden paychecks that are dished out to certain individuals beyond our understanding?
Really, how can we call this democracy when the cost of electioneering is totally out of reach of the majority of Nigerians and elections have become a game of who has the most money to spend?
In 1999, retired teachers could contest for governorship elections and win, but now, even a vice-chancellor of a federal university can hardly fund a local government chairmanship election today?
How did we get here, and can we ever turn back and get back to true and service-oriented politics?
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