Nigeria: political woes of you, me, and our politicians

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By Hashim Muhammad Suleiman, PhD

In Nigerian political parlance, we have no opposition. APC has given opposition all the soundbytes, textual evidences and videos for them to latch on and demarket the ruling party. Yet, the opposition is too uncoordinated to even make use of such free campaign materials.

Well, in Nigeria we have no political parties to start with. What we have are amalgamation of greedy individuals who see leadership as an avenue for wanton embezzlement and insane looting of public treasury. What is in APC is what is in PDP; is what is in LP and other laughable gatherings of hungry cats that await free and unclaimed carcasses to feast on.

So far, across all the so called political parties in Nigeria, no one single party can boast of not having people that haven’t been political refugees with no clear destination other than attempt to lay their hands on our collective assets. Such personally induced refugees have no shame whatsoever to be in APC today and crash into PDP tomorrow on their way screeching unto LP by next tomorrow.

Indeed, what we have are political prostitutes that openly trade their wares with no iota of shame. You find someone who’s spend eight years in PDP, who’s now in APC blaming all Nigerian woes on his former party. This points to nothing other than holding Nigerian electorates in contempt. Our political serpents are so good in changing their colours that even a Bahamian chameleon will watch them in stricken awe of how they change their political alliances within the blink of an eye.

What more, like our politicians like our electorates. No matter the contempt that our politicians hold the electorates with, it takes some few naira notes, religious and tribal sentiments to wash a lying politician clean to the electorates. In terms of enslaving Nigerian electorates, religion and tribalism are more than opium and even crack cocaine. What more of when those sentiments are lubricated with few naira mints?

Wallahi, I don’t want to be an agent provocateur of political and social doom in Nigeria. However, being a realistic person, I see no end to political rascality in Nigeria with all its consequent outcomes of insecurity, poverty, inflation, unemployment, thuggery, infrastructural decay, social vices, hunger, generalized crimes and other unforseen social degradation. This is not a projection, rather saying it as it is, based on many observable anecdotes.

The future is ours to mould: we can continue managing it as it is, if that’s what we want or we can jump up, change both the drivers and the steering wheels of this nation. Either way, what we plant is what we’ll harvest. We shouldn’t continue to put political rascals as our leaders and expect them to be political saints. As much as we blame the rascals for our political woes, you and me should also introspect ourselves and take the bitter pills of truthful self lies.

Until then, let’s continue to live with what we allowed to fester into a deadly carcass that’s oozing poisonous gases into our faces. Political woes in Nigeria are products of you, me and our politicians.

Muhammad can be reached via: mshashim@abu.edu.ng

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