Tahir Ibrahim Tahir
So much has been said about the victory of the PDP in the just concluded Ekiti Gubernatorial elections; but importantly, the unprecedented victory of the ruling party in a state presumably under the political ownership of the great opposition party APC deserves a rehash as Nigeria prepares for the 2015 polls, with the Ekiti experience serving as a litmus paper or yardstick for assessing: 1. The efficiency of INEC and 2. Voter independence and 3. Performance of both serving politicians (i.e governors, senators, reps and local government chairmen) and also their political parties.
Briefly, Governor elect Ayodele Fayose was impeached from office as governor of Ekiti state via an inquiry that emanated from the EFCC which ended up in the state house of assembly that impeached Fayose then; amidst jubilation from the Ekiti state people. This was not without some drama between the chief justice of the federation, eminent Ekiti lawyers and the chief judge of Ekiti state at the time. At the end of the day, Fayose bid goodbye to Ekiti state as it’s governor over financial impropriety allegations levelled agaisnt him. Today; 6 years after, he re-emerges as ‘amalinze’, the cat of Ekiti state politics as indeed, things have fallen apart for the APC as far as ekiti 2014 is concerned. Perhaps too, Fayose’s virility was underestimated or taken for granted which undid the opposition’s bid to retain the governorship of Ekiti state.
Pockets of foul cry and underhand electioneering have not constituted an overwhelming case for the APC to contest the outcome of the Ekiti verdict as obtained from the Anambra experience; this time round, Gov. Fayemi succinctly congratulated Fayose and promised to work together for a smooth transition and installation of a new government. Fayemi in so doing had displayed rare and unparallel political maturity which is one of the main recipes missing from our cookery book for the 2015 political dinner that awaits the nation.
The watermark that Nigerians might fail to see in the Ekiti polls is the certainty embellished in the success of the elections which is a verdict that Nigeria will exist beyond 2015 and that the shenanigans from the proponents of disintegration or regionalism are mere tools of political greed and economic dictatorship. Ekiti will certainly become a catalyst if not ‘the catalyst’ for the development of Nigerian politics. This will be by a renewed energy by the all powerful opposition congress to put it’s act together and further cement those ties that had brought it together in the first place. More energy will also come from the PDP as it seeks to replicate what it achieved with Fayose in Ekiti; arguably what Fayose achieved with PDP in Ekiti!
Soon enough, we as Nigerians will learn to discern that more often than not, candidates as opposed to parties and party ideologies are the key ingredients to a sustainable and progressive march towards the ‘harvesting’ of democratic dividends. Will it be safe to say that APC did not get it wrong but perhaps Fayemi did? It might also be safe to say that Ekiti state was wrong on Fayose before now, and so also the process that led to his ‘political demise’ in 2006. That or not; the extra ‘Amalinze’ life in Fayose is posed to #bringbackekiti from the jaws of poverty and the disconnect between the ruler and the ruled. The more and the earlier political parties and perhaps the ruling class identify the right persons for political leadership, the better for its followership and our democratisation process.
What remains a major foul in our march towards a new government is the violence and mayhem that pervades our societies which are evidently perpetrated for political and economic gain and worse still; remain unabated or unchecked for political gain as well. The innocence of the lost lives and the providence that will set therein will combine to incinerate everyone complicity involved with this inhumane and ungodly acts. By hook or by crook, by grand design or favour, Nigeria will be brought back in 2015 from a rudder less descent that suggests that Nigeria itself, all of us including, are simply clueless!
