Every election has its peculiarities and characteristics. The contestants may differ; their agenda may not be the same. This explains the expression that every election is local. But there are defining principles. Elections are supposed to usher in hope for the future, especially in a traumatised system as ours. They are moments to assure the people, the electorate, that the errors of the past would be corrected.
This is why election periods are moments of excitement and expectations. The incumbents asking for term renewal and other aspirants use the occasion to give the voters hope. They tell the voters what they would do differently, if elected or re-elected. For presidential candidates, the task is more. They carry on their shoulders the burden of marketing themselves and their political organisations. Put in relaxed terms, they are the faces of their parties, their poster boys or girls. That is why being the standard-bearer of a political party is a big deal. It is not a contest for boys but for serious minds. The office itself – the Presidency – demands a lot from the holder. In fact, to paraphrase Gerald R. Ford (38th U.S. President) the “presidency is not a prize to be won, but a duty to be done.”
It is the hardest job in the world, says American essayist, John Dickerson, in his piece on the White House. According to Dickerson, when the national fabric rends, the President will administer needle and thread, or at least reach for the sewing box of unity. This is a big lesson for those aspiring for Nigeria’s presidency in 2023.
Barely four months to the February 25, 2023, presidential election, Nigerians need to know the candidates. Knowing them is not merely knowing their names, identifying their faces or the political parties whose flags they are flying. The voters need to know their thinking, their level of sophistication and emotional intelligence. They need to know what the candidates represent in ideology and programmes at repositioning the country. For a system that has been maliciously held down by a chain of lethargic leadership in the greater part of its 62 years of statehood, having such details on those aspiring for the highest office in the land matters. They will enable perceptive voters make informed decisions on how to cast their ballots.
Five months after their emergence from the primaries of the various parties and two weeks after the official flag-off of campaigns by the Independent national Electoral Commission (INEC), the candidates are yet to present themselves to the voters, in the real sense of the word. Apart from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) that managed to kick off its presidential campaigns in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, last Monday, the other leading political parties, Labour Party (LP), All Progressives Congress (APC) and New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP), are yet to take off effectively. Even as the PDP rolled out its campaign, there was not much attributed to its candidate, Atiku Abubakar, that Nigerians could hold on to as commitment in taking the nation to a better level. His pronouncements before the campaign flag-off can hardly be taken as blueprints on what he would do if elected to office. Same goes for Peter Obi of LP, Bola Tinubu of APC and Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso of NNPP who are yet to commence their campaigns officially.
For now, most of what are taken as intentions of the candidates are snippets from their media offices and spokespersons. The dangers in this are many. Without hearing directly from the candidates, it may be difficult to hold any of them who emerges President accountable to assertions by their aides. The experience with President Buhari is enough to amplify the dangers in allowing hired hands be the ones to tell Nigerians what to expect from the candidates.
Recall that, at the height of its campaign in 2014, the APC laid out a bouquet of progressive ideas in its road map for fixing Nigeria. Among these were comprehensive overhaul of the nation’s dilapidated infrastructure, strengthening and stabilising the naira against the dollar and other international currencies, re-engineering the economy, tackling corruption and insecurity, as well as fiscal and physical restructuring of the country. But on coming to office in 2015, Buhari simply distanced himself from the APC manifesto, claiming that most of the promises were not made by him but by the party. The administration has since been tottering and floundering in most of its policy initiatives.
There are greater dangers ahead in flowing with the pronouncements of some of the fellows parading as spokesmen of the presidential candidates. There is no how any serious mind can reckon with utterances by Femi Fani-Kayode who speaks for Tinubu or Dino Melaye who fronts for Atiku, as pledges to rely on. By their antecedents and outings, these are characters who, ordinarily, are fit for jesters and entertainers in courts and palaces.
The role of spokespersons is strategic and quite complex. They market their parties, advertise the candidates and go further to convince the electorate on why they should give them their votes. The task is not simple and certainly not for fleeting minds. It requires men and women of ideas, tall in character, deep in content and coherent in delivery.
Nigeria had such men in the Second Republic. In the then Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), the likes of Melie Chukelu Kafundu (MCK) Ajuluchukwu, accomplished journalist, and Ebenezer Babatope, profound activist, played key roles in managing the research and publicity arm of the party, especially in promoting the programmes in its welfarist agenda.
In the rival Nigerian Peoples Party (NPP), drawing from the liberal philosophy of Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, the presidential candidate, and Adeniran Ogunsanya, the national chairman, the likes of Kola Balogun, Omo Omoruyi and Paul Unongo brilliantly espoused the party’s agenda on social justice and social change.
The National Party of Nigeria (NPN), which relatively appeared conservative, counted on the vibrancy of its intellectuals like Dr. Chuba Okadigbo, Dr. Ibrahim Tahir and others to market Green Revolution as one of its agricultural policies. Fani-Kayode, Melaye and other attack dogs of the present presidential candidates do not come near to these eggheads.
So, the candidates need to tell Nigerians what they have in the offer. Let Atiku, Obi, Tinubu, Kwankwaso and other standard-bearers assume leadership of their campaigns and address Nigerians on their agenda and strategies at fixing the nation. Nigerians need to hear from them on what they intend to do and how they intend to do so. In doing this, time is of essence.