Abdu Labaran Malumfashi.
Politics is most of the time about propaganda, or in a more appropriate word, ‘publicity’. If a leader has what is known as a ‘good press’, then majority of his bad deeds will hardly be known to the outside world, but if he possesses the opposite of a good press, then ALL his performances, even if they are exceptionally good, and in the interests of the majority of his people, the outside world would hardly be any the wiser, because the media would remain silent about most of those achievements.
Praise, is the word for survival for most of the media practitioners, not service to God and country, as is often said. White elephant projects, not the ones that are beneficial to the people, are often praised to high heavens. Many of the practitioners of the pen pushing profession, have distanced the media from its original role of serving as the ‘watchdog of the people’.
Whatever performance or abracadabra the political leader might do while he holds sway, most of the later day media people would always agree with and applaud, as if it was the perfect and only way of doing it.
But poetic ones in English language would say that, ‘a rose by any other name smells just as sweet’, like the Hausa language speaking wise person would state it this way, ‘ba’a chanza ma tuwo suna. Tuwo, sunanshi tuwo’.
Whatever the outcome may be to the society, God and posterity would remain the final judges of the matter, not the temporary praises or condemnations of the media, because such verdicts are often paid for before or after ‘delivery’.
This rumbling preamble is for the purpose of preparing the minds of all those concerned with the conduct and outcome of the forthcoming local government elections in my very own state, KATSINA, where Dr. (PhD) Dikko Umar Radda, is Governor on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
To be sure, the media had gone on the offensive immediately the Governor received the mantle of leadership in the state, but the initial hostility from the media has turned into, mostly, praises, on account of either his ‘superlative’ performance or his ‘big’ brown envelopes. I do not know, and therefore, cannot say which.
The usual thing is always to declare the ruling party by the State Independent Electoral Commission (SIEC), as the winner of ALL or most of the contested seats during the local government elections. The declared results often go contrary to the popularity of the ruling party.
This therefore, ridicules the Governor’s claim to governing with sincerity of purpose, or the sweet-sounding, but sycophantic phrase ‘uncommon’ this ‘uncommon’ that, used by public relations (PR) officials or hired pens, to describe the paymaster or his actions or both. It is an every day occurrence in this period of extreme hardship in the country.
Because of the propensity for the state electoral commissions to declare the incumbent ruling party as the outright winner of local government elections, some people argue in favour of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) conducting the elections.
But INEC officials, not unlike this writer, are not saints. Few may, but many may not, be averse to pocketing extra money, regardless of who gave it, and the purpose for which it was given. Besides, it is an open secret that no sitting president or governor ever loses at the election tribunal.
Which is why judges who prepare their tomorrow (hereafter) to be much better than their love for the glamour and trappings of today (present world), those who are known not to accept bribery from ANYBODY or ANY QUARTERS, are given a wide berth during the choice of the judges who would participate in election tribunals.
At the election tribunals, incumbents rarely lose, because of their control of the strings of the public purse, which is usually used very liberally on the election adjudicators. The case of a governor who purchased his reelection victory at the appeal election tribunal became an open secret long after he has become an ex governor.
The holier-than-though very wealthy and very old Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), who represented him at the appellate tribunal was totally shamed as a fraud, who allegedly ‘WON’ many of his cases corruptly.
Anyway, let His Excellency, the Governor of Katsina State not asceed to the demands of anybody, be them religious, political or traditional leaders, to favour any candidate. His Excellency should widen, not narrow, the election space, and make the process as fair, transparent, just and credible as possible.
It would amount to being very unfair of me not to write on this important issue, more so, as yours faithfully, has taken it upon himself to comment on everything under the sun (it would appear), or be the ‘police man’ of the nation at this very material time, when things are going on terribly and horribly wrong, with no apparent hope in sight. Besides, it may even occur to some uncharitable minds that, one might have been ‘SETTLED’ not to write on the issue at all.
May God make the candidates that actually care for their people, not their pockets, be victorious. May He also make the Katsina State SIEC do the right thing by conducting a fair, transparent, just and credible elections, where genuine winners will be announced, not PRESELECTED ‘victors’.
Malumfashi wrote from Katsina.
