I trust you all had a safe and uneventful Christmas break, as one can’t imagine there’s anything Nigerians crave more. Like play like play, the elections are no longer next year, but this year. They’re next month, but they’re so close that before you can say sungbalaja, we’ll be saying it’s this month. You can almost taste them.
Peter Obi
While you were tucking into your variety of birds and goat meat, many of those who would seek to lead Nigeria kept busy. Labour’s Peter Obi who, even if he doesn’t say it, is banking on the saleability of his virtuousness. Which is not to suggest it’s insincere, it’s merely an observation. And this Christmas he wasn’t at the inn, but in the proverbial manger, spending time with internally displaced people in Benue state. This gave the G5 governor, Samuel Ortom, another opportunity to champion Obi’s candidacy.
Bola Tinubu
Bola Tinubu of APC gave a Christmas address, complete with anybody-here-want-to-give-their-life-to-Christ backing piano and with a bit of a BTS* chuckle at the end for a dash of extra humanisation of the candidate. The former governor of Lagos is of course a Muslim, with the choice of Kassim Shettima, having made “Muslim-Muslim ticket” a thing. Would such a ticket of two people of the same religion (or even ethnicity) matter if Nigeria were not so riven with ethno-religious division? Shouldn’t their ability to deliver for all Nigerians be the important factor, rather than whether they clutch the Roman Catholic rosary or the tasbih? Simply deliver electricity for citizens to worship as they please and water to baptise and ablute as they like.
But then, perhaps representation is paramount in a country as pluralistic as Nigeria. What we’d like to know though, who is looking out for the animists and the faithless? It is also worth mentioning that Tinubu’s wife Senator Oluremi Tinubu is a Christian. And not just as a Sunday tonic, she’s a pastor at RCCG. So there’s already a Muslim-Christian ticket of sorts in the Tinubu household.
Atiku Abubakar
Atiku Abubakar also delivered a Christmas address, but he went for the traditional We Wish You A Merry Christmas as backing music. He did miss a trick however, because he could’ve rereleased this gem from four years ago. Nigeria is a country bereft of self awareness and shame, which is why such a political leader can release a Christmas x Campaign song. Self awareness and shame are seen as social deterrents to bad behaviour, but I say pushing through self awareness and shame is where greatness lies. Granted, Christmas x Campaign is not a good example of this “greatness”, but that’s a whole other issue.
Insight into the mind of former president Olusegun Obasanjo
By far the biggest story of the Christmas break was former President Olusegun Obasanjo endorsing Peter Obi. OBJ came up with a whole new acronym, TVCP (track record, vision, characters, physical and mental capacity) for judging a candidate. Read the text to gain an insight into the mind of a former president.
But you can be assured that TVCP will enter the Nigerian political lexicon forever to torment us. Like fencist, national cake, and dividends of democracy, our pages will henceforth be blackened by TVCP. The reaction from the parties was entirely predictable. So if you’d like to test how au fait you are with Nigerian politics, you could think of what an APC, PDP, or Labour spokesperson might say, and check online whether you’re correct. It’ll be one of the easiest tests you ever pass.
And don’t forget Goodluck Jonathan
At the risk of showing bias in favour of one former president, it should be acknowledged that Goodluck Jonathan also had an audience with Peter Obi. There wasn’t so much an endorsement as a milquetoast “one Nigeria” meeting, and he even went out of his way to say he wasn’t giving an endorsement. The encounter between Obi and Jonathan, and Obi and Obasanjo, shows the sharp contrast between the two former presidents. One was a Goodluck by name, good luck by nature kumbaya president, who stumbled into the top offices in Bayelsa state and Nigeria by dint of being a deputy at the right time. While fire and brimstone Obasanjo on the other hand wrested the presidency each time he led Nigeria. The endorsements and non-endorsements, quelle surprise, follow the exact same pattern.