The political scene in the country is to say the least quite intriguing. The heightening of the political temperature all started with the carefully orchestrated irreconcilable differences between the leadership of the National Assembly and the Executive arm of government, headed by President Muhammadu Buhari. While the leadership of the National Assembly had to part ways with the APC, the party that guaranteed the emergence of both Bukola Saraki and Yakubu Dogara as the indisputable arrowheads of the Legislative arm of government. They emerged as leaders in the Senate and House of Representatives despite the disapproval of the party’s heavyweights like Ahmed Bola Tinubu. Over time, things started heating up uncontrollably. The aloofness of Mr. President to political intrigues within his party did not help matters at all.
APC then started behaving as a party that belongs to everybody and nobody at the same time. Consequently, there was massive exodus out of the party. As that is happening, the ghost of PDP was invoked through the charms and incantations of its powerful men. They are those that have this bad habit of chasing power without scruples or compunction. Anyway, PDP was miraculously resurrected. And like a stubborn wax, it gains lots of strength and solidity gratis through its sticky tapestry. Of course, this is coming out of Mr. President’s sheer misreading of the game, or is it his underestimation of overambitious APC bigwigs. Actually, the PDP has steadily reenergized itself as it suddenly reappears like the mythical phoenix on Nigeria’s political firmament.
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On the successful resurrection of the PDP from the dead, we give credit to the image of the party leader of the APC who all alone has been standing helplessly over developments in the party. As you and I know it well enough, President Buhari did not think that building the party on some quasi-ideological pedestal is as necessary as his obsession with fighting corruption, which he singlehandedly interpreted as providing quality leadership to Nigerians. He has really disappointed those Nigerians that thought the messiah has finally arrived to right all the wrongs in the country like that magician in the land of the foolish that was counseled by the great owl of oz. Even on the governance quotient, he has been adjudged to perform below the expectations of his whopping supporters.
After the Port Harcourt hurly-burly of the APC carpetbaggers that unabashedly crossed over to the PDP, there was the phenomenal political resurgence of an Atiku Abubakar with all the backing of even the sworn enemies of his old PDP days. Like the tsunami of some deep ocean, the clutching of the PDP presidential ticket by this man Atiku Abubakar has really sent huge shock waves to the APC circles. All of a sudden even the lackadaisical Buhari has now rediscovered the value of a cohesive political party for at least the purpose of an electioneering campaign. There was indeed so much panic following the announcement of Atiku Abubakar, particularly with the seeming peace of the graveyard that has defined the comportment of other contestants in the face of such a fait accompli.
The names that were being speculated before the PDP convention could not however make it to the finish line. Perhaps with the possible exception of Nyesom Wike, the powerful governor of Rivers state, all other PDP contestants have accepted the good counseling of the wise old Generals that have reconvened in PDP after its going under from the unexpected victory of the APC in 2015. Names like Rabi’u Musa Kwankwaso, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, Abubakar Bukola Saraki, Sule Lamido and other lesser notables have willy-nilly decided to sink and swim with the repackaged carcass of the PDP, because each one of them has resolved to throw in their weight solidly behind their party flag bearer.
The beauty of Nigerian politics lies in the rolling of the dice as the good, the bad and the ugly all lock horns in the contest for the elixir of power for power’s sake. And like a Pandora’s box, the putrid content of our brand of politics is everywhere stinking to high heavens. It all started with the restless army of social media pundits, to borrow Hillary Clinton’s expression, the “basket of deplorables”. In our own case, they are those that are occupying free communication spaces on the Internet, including noisy Facebook upstarts, Twittersphere sloths and Blogger warriors on both sides of the political divide, APC and PDP, as they hurl verbal sorties on their opponents. Beyond Nigerian politics, the picture is pretty much the same elsewhere.
The birth of social media has clearly trivialized our political culture. Though this can be said to be happening on a universal scale when one looks at the murky waters of politics in Theresa May’s United Kingdom and Donald Trump’s America, two countries that Nigerians are idealizing. Politics is no longer as we used to know it. In fact, politics is not in any sense of the word issue based. It used to be that but not any more. Politics is all about unbridled sentiments in the defense of whatever interest suits one at the moment. This is what postmodern subjectivity has thrown up in a world that is not only controlled by corporate capitalism (read here as greed), but one that solicits our consent through its hyperrealism and deceptive allurement.
In Nigeria, the stakes are much high. As politicians weigh their chances with the ease they carpet cross from one political dung heap to another, their foot soldiers have been digging deeper into the ground of their blind support and incomprehensible irrationality. Candidates are not judged on their capabilities or competences. Often, they are judged on the basis of undiluted sentimental attachments to whatever interests they represent. This is where politics and principles have decided to part ways. However, as the political battles rage between the gladiators of the dominant political camps in the land, trivialities are now the campaign issues. The thin line dividing politics and propriety has been completely blurred.
To illustrate this, President Buhari has now transmogrified into one Jibrin from Sudan, according to the gospel of his opponents. To his supporters, he is Mr. Integrity who sees himself as the measure of all that is good and righteous in the country. But his opponents are not willing to buy that mantra. They see him differently from the prism of their own political lenses. In that regard, they see him as incompetent, and as one who is not in charge of his faculties and the Nigerian state he was elected to govern. They also see him as narrow-minded, clannish and nepotistic, one who looks the other way where the corruption of his closest associates is the issue. The alleged cases of his Chief of Staff Abba Kyari and Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, the Governor of Kano that was caught on camera in the act, are some of the cases trigger happily invoked by the political opponents of the President.
In equal measure, Atiku Abubakar is described as unrepentantly corrupt, and is diametrically opposed to Mr. Integrity. He is a moneybag, a reincarnation of the evil and corruption that PDP symbolized in its 16 years misrule. He was alleged to be bribing his way with lots of money in the party primaries that saw his emergence as the PDP Presidential candidate that bought his way to clinch the PDP Presidential ticket through the sheer power of the dollar. What with his Dubai get together with his party apparatchiks? Atiku cannot also travel to the United States for fear of being arrested by the FBI. This was ingrained in the imagination of his staunchest political enemies. Although he is touted as competent, intelligent, organized and adequately prepared for the job, his opponents also see him differently. They see him only as the candidate of the business class, and not one to be trusted by ordinary Nigerians. As the political intrigues thickened, there is so much mud slinging between the APC and the PDP. In one of the instances, the Chief Justice of Nigeria Walter Onnoghen was called upon to resign from office. He should be arraigned before the Code of Conduct Tribunal for improper declaration of asset. From a hazier perspective, he was alleged to have perfected plans to adjudge the 2019 elections in favor of the PDP Presidential candidate in the event of inconclusive outcome of the elections.
In all the politicking, fundamental issues in society are however conveniently ignored, skipped or at best glossed over. In this uneven terrain of sloppiness, folly seems to have taken over the better side of Nigerians. In all this, it is not the politicians that suffer the consequences. It is the nation that pays the ultimate price.
