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“The vote is the most powerful instrument ever devised by man for breaking down injustice and destroying terrible walls which imprisoned men because they are different from other men”
— Lyndon Johnson
Since 2015, democracy in Nigeria has been at a tipping point; the economy has gone comatose, unity and oneness bastardised by the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari’s reckless and unwise policies. In the midst of this crisis, Nigeria became the poverty capital of the world and life became more brutish, laborious and even thingified. In all and courtesy of the All Progressives Congress, Nigeria is on a despicable free fall. Worst still, the APC and its presidential candidate, Bola Tinubu, and his running mate, Kashim Shettima, do not represent a resolve for change or a pathway to redeeming Nigeria from the doldrums. Instructively, Tinubu has even promised and pledged to continue with Buhari’s scorched-earth policies. A statement that has indirectly forewarned Nigerian voters ahead of the February presidential vote.
For the People’s Democratic Party, the emergence of Atiku Abubakar and the power brokers that surround him and the PDP are up to no good for the country. Their quest and body language do not indicate a re-cleansing mood that will shade off the reckless squandermania culture the party unleashed on Nigeria between 1999 and 2015. Rather than position itself as a reformatory party, the PDP has continued to parade itself as a transactional party of buy and sell. Regrettably, and as represented by its National Chairman, Dr Iyorchia Ayu, there is still that gusto of arrogance, insensitivity and disrespect for citizens. If the PDP National Chairman could call governors of his party, children; governors who held the party together when Atiku and Ayu connived with the APC to cause PDP defeat in 2015, what will he not call ordinary citizens if Atiku and himself ever get this power back?
On insensitivity, to date, the National Chairman of the PDP is a northerner, presidential candidate, a northerner, Chairman of Board of Trustees, a northerner. Beyond the insensitivity, the PDP is indirectly telling southerners that the PDP was created solely for Atiku—the southerners have been funding the party but cannot fly the party’s presidential ticket (especially the South-East). Not only that, even the thought of replacing Buhari with another of his kith and kin in a country of 240 tribes is the height of insensitivity, arrogance and even shame. So, where is social justice?
It is in the midst of this jaundiced and lopsided equation, that the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi, emerged and seen both online and offline as the great hope of choice. The aim of Obi’s presidential candidacy is to save Nigeria in order to avoid a catastrophic collapse. Thus, ahead of the 2023 presidential run, every Nigerian must devote his or her time to disrupt the criminal state being promoted by the ruling elites. There should be every effort to put that to a logical end. Who then is Peter Obi? And can he disrupt the Nigerian prebendal state? Does he have the character to stir Nigeria away from the destructive sharing culture to a culture of production and industrialisation?
First, the defining logic of Obi’s presidential candidacy lies squarely on probity. That he is able to pass and triumph over the test of probity, accountability and transparency that many Nigerian politicians will fail woefully. He has even come out to poignantly declared that, “if I have taken public money that I am not entitled to, God should punish me and my children.” If Nigerians really want to secure and take back their country, can the other two presidential candidates of APC and PDP make similar declarations? Can they publicly declare that for the whole of their lives, there are no traces of enriching themselves with public treasury?
The greatest national anger against the ruling elites is the disregard for accountability—where public treasury is seen as an open purse for sharing among the political class. In Peter Obi, his supporters see the idea to continually stay above board; where public funds are deployed for the public good but not personal enrichment; where Nigerians can sleep and feel sure that the national wealth will not grow wings. Moreso, Obi carries himself with the humility and energy that a modern presidency should boast of. Robert Y. Shapiro et al (2000) in their work, Presidential Power: Forging the Presidency in the Twenty-First Century, argued that today’s presidency is confronted with enormous challenges and difficulties, such that, any president worth his or her salt must have the tenacity and energy for performance. A threshold, Obi aptly fits into. Conversely, it’s doubtful if Tinubu and Atiku can afford such tenacity and energy required for the running of the modern presidency. A demand that is compounded by their age.
More so, Peter Obi comes across as a very clear-headed man, with integrity and verifiable records. From his place of origin, education, wealth acquisition, and track records in public office, Obi comes top among the pack of presidential candidates. The other candidates do not boast of such credentials. And given the precarious situation, Nigeria is faced with at this critical juncture, these qualities are essential in reclaiming Nigeria and ending the prevailing woes.
In Anambra State, as a governor, Obi ensured that each community had its pet project dear to its inhabitants. The state government funded those projects and ensure that the various communities owned them. He left a remarkable legacy in the state coffers no Nigerian governor has matched. In eight years, Obi drastically changed the gory story of Anambra State from a crime haven to a sane state where business and saneness thrived. That in itself is a test of statesmanship no one has rivalled to date.
Thus, the nationwide rally and movement for Peter Obi is organic, not rented. It is a movement that seeks to redress Nigeria’s crisis of leadership recruitment and national crisis. Critically, Peter Obi’s presidential candidature evokes a lost country many Nigerians are yearning to reclaim from those who have ruined and ravaged the nation for 62 years. The 2023 presidential election, therefore, is a period that the fuller idea of a true national consciousness of a great Nigeria beckons. We must all take it with some sense of critical responsibility. As President Lyndon Johnson argued above, in February 2023, Nigerians must be willing to deploy their votes as a powerful instrument to end social injustice and break down terrible walls of poverty and state failure.
- Obi, a journalist and political communication researcher, writes from Abuja
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