Footprints Without Imprints
All the men and women who paid tens or hundreds of millions of naira for expression of interest and nomination forms in various political parties in order to run for President, have they paused for a minute and thought about what they are bargaining for?
I thought by now the Nigerian Presidency will be so unattractive that people will have to be begged to come and take it. Why should anyone be eager to inherit Boko Haram, terrorists, bandits, kidnappers, secessionists, communal warriors, oil thieves, sea pirates, depreciated naira, depleted foreign reserves, high debt service ratio, plummeting oil production, astronomical costs of diesel and aviation fuel, high unemployment, suspension of rail and aviation services, trillions in petrol subsidy, unimplementable Petroleum Industry Act, 13million out of school children, bloated civil service, ASUU strike, impending police strike, exploding illegal refineries, oil spills, River Niger flooding, advancing Sahara desert, shrinking Lake Chad, porous borders, flood of small arms, corruption, fake drugs, fake news, ritual killers, currency counterfeiting, frequent national grid collapse, hikes in
DSTV, telecom and electricity tariffs, Ajaokuta Steel white elephant, partially completed Second Niger bridge, Apapa traffic snarl, off again on again COVID and fallout of Ukraine war?
Whether all these were caused by “the rot PDP left after 16 years in power” or “the destruction of Nigeria in 8 years of APC rule” is beside the point. Personally, I will not accept this basket Free of Charge, not to mention for N100 million.
Yet, as at Friday, according to one report, 25 people had paid N100m each and purchased APC’s expression of interest and nomination forms. APC’s National Organising Secretary Sulaiman Argungu said as at Thursday last week, 15 aspirants had paid N100m each for presidential nomination forms, 48 aspirants paid N50m each for governorship forms, 241 people paid N20million each for senatorial forms, 821 aspirants paid N10m each for House of Representatives forms while 1,505 aspirants paid N2m each for State House of Assembly forms. There was however a rush on Friday and the numbers increased by leaps and bounds.
APC extended its sale of forms to Tuesday, by which date the number of aspirants for all the positions is expected to rise even further. That only 48 persons had picked its governorship forms was a surprise, given that Nigerian politicians are attracted to Government Houses like bees are to nectar. 20 state governors will be completing their second terms next year or soon afterwards. This is an incentive for a lot more aspirants to wade into the race. In Nigeria, challenging a sitting governor in an election is politically and socially hazardous. Things are a bit easier when the throne is about to become vacant.
At the time PDP closed its receipt of applications, 17 aspirants picked its presidential nomination forms. Two were disqualified by the screening committee led by former Senate President David Mark. The appeals committee upheld the disqualifications. The disqualified aspirants were the least familiar names on the list, so all the heavyweight aspirants are still in the race. Even though PDP’s NEC is set to meet on Wednesday to decide on zoning its presidential ticket, I think the matter is already overtaken by events because it is difficult to tell a person who successfully passed screening that he can no longer contest on account of zoning.
Another curiosity of this moment is that