Nigeria’s practise of democracy involves participatory campaign efforts that allows everyone in the loop, but ends the inclusivity of committed electorates who work tirelessly at the polls immediately after voting is completed. This is often after the electorates fulfil their own part of the social contract involving the voting for candidates on trust with high hopes for democracy dividends from elected politicians.
It happens that shortly after the election victory, hapless citizens disappointingly start observing strange attitudes, often with sudden unfriendly countenance, signifying breach of trust, from these elected politicians who distance themselves from their constituents. They find that they are no longer given a say or allowed to contribute their views on how governance proposals and decisions are made, especially as may have been earlier agreed upon. This method of relating with those that voted them in, and this disappointing engagement style used by some politicians does not essentially ensure deliverance of democracy for the people. Democracy that is practised in Nigeria is defrocked of its full definition and attributes because, the political leaders in this country, deceitfully, do not walk their talk. Theirs is a catalogue of unfulfilled, vain political promises, which has remained a trend plaguing the nation’s political space. Once they grab power after they are voted in, they automatically turn their backs on the electorates and refuse to fulfil their campaign promises. These are the politicians that “whether you vote or don’t vote they will find a way of getting into power,” in the words of Elo Amucheazi, the Nigerian political science professor.
The above experience has been a recurring decimal in the relationship between Nigerian electorates and most political candidates from different political parties. Major causes of this unwholesome behaviour of most political office holders are traceable to the desperation to hijack elective positions through a do-or-die approach. Another is rooted in the rush-to-bottom syndrome that ends up producing mediocre people that are not fit to handle top, responsible positions that demand professional expertise. Peaceful transfer of power can never be achieved through thuggery or electoral violence but by democratically observed electoral processes (from start to finish). That is the only way effective, responsive and responsible governance (equipped with rule of law, human rights and civic participation by the electorate) could be realised. In the current circumstance where laws are hardly obeyed, which is political corruption, Nigerian politicians are enjoined to retrace their steps and recognise that it cannot always be a do-or-die affair, if Nigeria must survive and grow. The right electioneering campaign only demands mobilising and sensitising the electorate with genuine and deliverable campaign promises. It is the only approach that can sustain the reassuring belief of the electorates in political leaders, especially for the corporate existence of the country. It is on this note that the right structure and the right leadership required for democratic governance can yield promising interest for the people, with an overwhelming cohesion of national values.
Practical solutions to social problems demand humane attention and not the manifesting of insensitivity over issues that bother on socio-economic challenges that trouble the entire citizenry. The resourceful contribution and the competence of our democratically elected politicians through free, fair and credible elections shall chase away every semblance of economic recession because they shall produce carefully elected capable hands to lead the nation, where the citizenry shall effectively benefit from the right solutions provided through democratic governance.
We need to push the boundaries by setting the standards that shall reestablish a federation with a model suitable to our indigenous circumstances, that shall be patriotically run on fiscal federalism terms, where we respectively control our resources and contribute to the centre in this pluralistic society with 389 ethnic groups. Nigeria’s challenges may not get any better if the federal government insists on controlling 68 policy areas in her exclusive list, with the existing states left with just a few in the concurrent list. Let’s be visionary, and think as patriots who sincerely desire a formidable and stable nation.
The health and the future of the national economy of this country significantly lies at the mercy of the political leaders of Nigeria. Head or tail, it is the political leaders that shall determine the direction of the nation’s economic growth because the final buck stops at their table. Good governance is simply what every average Nigerian craves for. Majority of Nigerians are, on the average, very independent creatures that are capable of fending for themselves and catering for their families. All they demand from the governments at all tiers is provision of the basic amenities, preparation of an enabling environment to enable them take care of their respective daily commercial and economic activities. Our political leaders are therefore urged to render the enabling support for Nigerians to go about their respective daily businesses, assignments and duties, without undue hindrances and socioeconomic challenges.
- business a.m. commits to publishing a diversity of views, opinions and comments. It, therefore, welcomes your reaction to this and any of our articles via email: comment@businessamlive.com
