The Choice

At the height of the Ebola crisis in Nigeria, there were some macabre quips about choosing a disease. The joke goes thus: a certain person went to run some tests at the hospital and he comes out rejoicing about the disease he tested positive for, people around are baffled that he’s rejoicing over being HIV positive and he says “at least, it’s not Ebola!”

Choice isn't always grand, sometimes the options before us are so bad that we’d rather avoid making a choice. But every responsible person must make a choice at some point, the alternative is a lifetime of victimhood.  This brings me to the choice before us on February 14^th and I'm not talking cakes or flowers.

Everywhere I turn I hear arguments for or against the two main presidential candidates. I often find some of these arguments quite disturbing because they tell me that we are no longer interested in good governance. I recently heard someone say that the president should be allowed to ‘complete’ his second term as if it were a God given right for every president to have two terms in office. This is similar to saying that a student shouldn't be given a fail grade just because s/he showed up at the exam hall! This argument usually emanates from people who happen to be from Nigeria’s ‘down under’.

In response to the president’s ultra-soft stance on corruption, the argument is that corruption is systemic in Nigeria and there’s little or nothing that can be done about it. I believe that no matter how gargantuan a problem is, it can be solved when there’s a will. If a leader’s body language says ‘I don’t give a damn’ about stealing then where is the will for the followers to take a stance against it? One of the most glaring instances of this is the case of a minister who presided over a 2.5 trillion naira scam not too long ago, this same minister has been recommended for a prominent international position. I cannot catalogue every instance of this administration’s romance with graft but I know that it is pretty obvious that we are currently in the most enabling dispensation for graft, theft, embezzlement, misappropriation (I don't want to use that nebulous word ‘corruption’ lest some people get into a hysteria of hair splitting semantics)

The latest argument for the incumbent’s reelection was put forward by someone whom I feel should know better. The PDP’s gubernatorial aspirant for Lagos state argues that GEJ should be reelected to prevent South-South militants from blowing up our oil wells thereby destroying what’s left of our battered economy. This thinking is shocking first because it suggests that Nigerians are under siege and must obtain their freedom by voting against their will. It’s also shocking for a less obvious reason – this argument tells me that even Mr. Agbaje knows within himself that there’s no plausible reason to elect his party’s presidential candidate, so he resorts to the vote for my president or the bogeyman will get you argument!

Another tenuous defense of this administration is the fact that the man at the helm has good intentions but very bad advisers. Well, leadership is about influence not just political office, if all the people who surround a leader are bad and incompetent then there is a need for the leader to undergo a thorough self-examination. A long time ago, I read the autobiography of Lana Turner, a Hollywood star of the 40’s and 50’s. She had married and divorced 7 different men but she somehow managed to pin the blame for the failure of the marriages on the men and I just wondered about the odds of such a saintly woman attracting 7 horrible men in one lifetime. At best, the failed marriages say something about her judgment.

The APC candidate is by no means an ideal candidate. He’s an ex-military head of state who’s known to have violated many human rights and he’s also made some very provocative statements. The fact of our very limited choices for leadership is a symptom of the state of the nation.  It tells the tale of a country that is still hamstrung by primordial affiliations to tribe and religion; it tells of a people who have become so cynical that the very notion of good leadership has become unthinkable.

Be that as it may, we cannot fold our arms and sit on the fence and expect things to ‘work out’ by some stroke of luck. We must work with what we have until we get something better; we as a people, have to make a choice no matter how unpleasant. Inaction is often acquiescence to the status quo. The choice for me isn't so much about the candidate, the choice is about my hope for change though some may argue vehemently that the opposition won’t change anything, well we will have a chance to find out if that’s true or false in the next 4 years (if they win).

The president has had 6 years to convince us that he can do the job and to some people he has proved himself but to others, he has failed. The imminent election is a chance for those who believe he has failed to choose someone else in the hope that that person will do a better job. That’s democracy.