The Naija code of conduct
Nothing beats the African political campaign season. The season when all gloves are off including but not limited to decency and decorum. Libel and character assassination are in and if you are modest, perhaps politrics is not for you. With each passing political époque, the level of indecency increases. In this season, you could call politricians by the names neither their parents nor their parties officially identify them and the heavens would not fall. Out the door goes the traditional respect for elders, aspiration is a leveler.
It is a sign of weakness for those angling to join the ruining class to concern themselves with trifles and nothing is more trifling than a candidate suing social media handlers for calling them names. Candidates are thieves, rogues and vagabonds when contesting, saints when they win.
This is one season when mainstream media editors send their reporters and writers back to the class of Journalism 101. Libel is very difficult to proof in court, but judges are known to be ruthless with editors and publishers who take their gatekeeping jobs lightly. The time-tested defense of absolute and qualified privileges is hardly covering for those who malign and impugn the characters of aspirants. People can’t fight fair when the game is foul.
Now that twenty-four presidential hopefuls have accepted their party’s nomination, dirt excavators would be busy exhuming every putrid skeleton to pollute the chances of their opponents. Their opponents would be working hard to make sure their reputation dims in the eye of reasonable members of the public. Issues would take a back seat. Where gatekeepers refuse to accept a bad documentary, it wouldn’t prevent it going viral on social media. By the time administrators’ wake up to their responsibilities as doorkeepers, the damage is usually done.
It was four years ago when Digbolugi Fayose took the trash campaign a dip lower with his morbid adverts against the opposition candidate. We could only expect things to get worse, not better.
As far as records go, performance is in the eye of the beholder. The incumbent is not bound to fight fair if his opponents are splashing him with mud. They would scratch the surface for evidence of achievements that the electorate has trouble seeing. This is one era when it is difficult to determine who executed what project. Local government administrators would put their signposts on state projects; state governments would put theirs on federal schemes and sinnators and rebels would lay claim to having provided oxygen as constituency projects.
In the confusion, politricians would make promises they’ll never keep. With no timekeeper to keep tab on promises, striking out fulfilled from unfulfilled would be a Herculean task. Aspirants would promise a highway to heaven if elected and point to massive deaths as prove that people are gladly traveling on it.
Certain things do not change with each political campaign epoch. Incumbents believe in the power not to lose elections. Governors that have finished their terms without visible achievements already see themselves in higher positions. They’ll take a shot at the presidency, retirement into the upper legislative chamber or ministerial appointment. Never a future in oblivion.
As people worry for the political future of the likes of Aminu Tambuwal and his co-travelers in the last PDP primaries, they forget that politricians have the characteristic of the Phoenix. They could effortlessly rise from the ashes of political oblivion to the zenith of national prominence.
Unlike supporters, critics and hecklers who break time-tested bonds to support their chosen politrician; political actors make no permanent friends or enemies. The ideology of the average politrician is access to the commonwealth. They cross carpets to get there. They kill, maim and cripple anything and anyone that dares to stop them. Morality is not inscribed in their code of conduct. They would invent and use the worst phrases to put down their colleagues if they disagree in one minute; then embrace and drink to their unbroken friendship the next. Like shameless dogs, they’ll lap at their own vomit without scruples.
It was not long ago when Atiku Abubakar jumped off the PDP train describing it as irredeemable. He has now found the redemption wand, as it’s official flag bearer. Muhammadu Buhari’s new bedfellows couldn’t have laced the shoes of his preelection integrity. They are his best friends and errand boys. Here is the man who promised to reduce the unnecessary planes on the presidential fleet, fly commercial, die in Garki clinic rather than go abroad for medical treatment; build one refinery for each year in office and bring the dollar at par with the Naira. Without as much as an excuse for not redeeming on his promises, Buhari seeks a second mandate.
The same group of influencers who ganged up against President Jones four years ago are in secret meetings to block Buhari’s second term goal. They have swallowed their words and their pride in the process. Where is the electorate in all these? They are free to do as directed by their poverty of vision and the dictates of stomach infrastructure. They’ll kill or maim each other to proof loyalty to the politrician who is oblivious of their existence. With such code of engagement on both sides, why do we lament that the country is way off the map of progress?