By Anthony Onwuka
It was the late Reggae music idol, Robert Nesta Marley better known as Bob Marley who sang in one of his songs: “You can fool some people sometimes, but you can’t fool all the people all of the time”. This demonstrates the limit to how much one can take the people for granted.
For far too long, the Nigerian people have been reduced to slaves and used as pawns in the game of political chess. They are considered relevant and needed during elections and thereafter left to wallow in penury while the elected and their family members live in opulence. The masses are left barely able to get a square meal.
In a desperate bid to cling unto power, leaders often resort to fraudulent activities during elections most times with the connivance of electoral umpires who churn out results that even the devshudder at. The 2023 elections are a sharp reminder and a study in itself of this anomaly.
In a facade of transparency, two professors; academics who supervised elections in Akwa Ibom State, were recently jailed three years each for doctoring election results in favor of some candidates in the 2023 elections. This gives a false impression of a government that is cut out for transparency. The government can not be when the politician beneficiary of the cheating is not equally reprimanded. The politician who this lie produced ought to be disqualified and prosecuted. Unfortunately, our electoral processes are fraught with irregularities, with results tilted in favor of the highest bidders, most often.
But I see the possibility that 2027 elections will not be business as usual. The APC administration of Bola Tinubu should be reminded that “thunder does not strike at the same place twice.” They succeeded in rigging themselves into power the last time, but it does not mean they will have it their own way this time around. Nigerians are wiser by the day.
The APC has inadvertently shot herself in the foot. Her members, of their own volition, have dug their graves. Their rejection has been long signed, sealed, and waiting to be delivered in 2027. Nigerians can not wait to exact their pound of flesh from a government that has, in the last 10 years, shown them hardship and suffering pro Max. A dehumanizing experience where many Nigerians have been reduced to eating from hand to mouth or scavenging trash bins for leftovers.
Under the Tinubu administration, no one is smiling. Nigerians are witnessing the mother of all hardships, crushing inflation, food insecurity, and unprecedented hike in commodity prices like petrol, electricity, telecoms, transportation and high taxation. Their failed economic policies have led to the exit of many multinational businesses from the country, while indigenous business outfits are closing shop and retrenching staff in the wake of unfavorable business climate in the country.
With the aforementioned scenario, APC’s chances of winning the 2027 elections is next to impossible, except in their wishful thinking of achieving it through their usual rigging tactics, having successfully planted INEC Resident Electoral Commissioners in all the States, including the FCT. Yes, they may have the security agencies, the INEC chairman, but not Nigerians.
We can avoid the repeat of the sham elections of 2023 if we resist their sophisticated plan to write or rig the 2027 elections. otherwise, we shall all continue in pain.
The youth must rally behind a candidate with capacity and popularity like former Vice President H.E Atiku Abubakar, who can effectively challenge Tinubu and his cohorts come 2027. Anything short of this would be giving the APC a blank cheque to continue with a devilish agenda that will further impoverish the Nigerian people and further sink the country into oblivion. Tufiakwa!
The North, East, West, and South are we ready to liberate ourselves from the shackles of APC? The ball is in our court!
With Atiku Abubakar, we can make Nigeria great again!
