Believe it or not, the fearful general elections have come and gone. Wake from your dreams: Nigeria is still intact; no break-up as foretold by the disciples of Nostradamus. And no war is raging as feared by all. The results of the elections at all levels have become history except in some states like Imo and Taraba where the exercise was inconclusive and a re-run had been ordered for this weekend.
Wonders, indeed, shall never end. How are the mighty fallen and the weapons of election (dollars and naira) perished! Or do I say: “How have the mighty fallen!” Nigeria conducted the most expensive exercise in the world. Money was spent in a reckless manner. It was alleged that about N2trn was sunk into the project by the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its sister party, the Dame Patience Party (DPP).
That amount is about half of the nation’s annual budget… all in an attempt to retain power. DPP took advantage of the six-week extension needed to flush out the Boko Haram militants from the beleaguered North-east axis and launched the most vicious campaign ever recorded in our electoral history.
Rather than gain more mileage, the DPP courted more foes for the parent party. Whatever goodwill the PDP enjoyed especially in the North was destroyed by the leader of the DPP, Dr. Dame Patience Jonathan by her words and deeds. In fact, the duo of Buhari and Osinbajo should be grateful to Mama Peace for the part she played in ensuring the downfall of PDP after 16 short years as a ruling party.
Talking about spending money on campaign, it was not that the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) did not spend money during the exercise especially at the presidential level. But the cash at its disposal was like (small) change… a euphemism for pittance. However, the change which is the slogan of the party worked for it as it rubbished the belief propagated by King Solomon in Ecclesiastes 10: 19b that “money answereth all things”. If it worked for the world’s wisest man in the splendor of his palace, it did not work for Jonathan.
At the height of the presidential campaign, before you could hear Buhari’s name mentioned once, you would have been deafened by all manner of radio and teevee jingles adulating Jonathan and why we must return him to the Aso Rock Villa. I am still wondering how the old soldier escaped being crushed by tons of newspaper advertisements, advertorials and sponsored articles crafted in the most damaging manner that even moved some of his ardent critics to ask: “Why all this hatred?”
Another political juggernaut who must be wondering why money could not answer all things is the outgoing Governor David Jonah Jang of Plateau state.
The PDP arrowhead deployed huge resources to secure the gubernatorial seat for his godson, Senator Gyang Pwajok. Aside from the fact that money failed to answer the godfather, he has been classified as one of those pastors who hear their own voices but mistake them to be the voice of God. Baba Jang, as if you don’t know him, is an ordained pastor of COCIN. Months before the PDP primaries, the state’s stakeholders were locked in a bitter zoning battle. All the three senatorial zones of the state had produced a governor each, beginning with the late Chief Solomon Daushep Lar from the southern zone – 1979 to 1983, followed by Chief Joshua Chibi Dariye from the central zone – 1999 to 2007.
Then 2011 came and in keeping to the spirit of zoning, the train steamed to a stop at the northern zone. Baba Jang, a two-time military governor, became the choice of apostles of zoning. He was promptly bundled into the train.
Eight years down the rail tracks, Baba Jang was expected to facilitate the entrainment of a southern candidate in the spirit of justice and equity. The zoning arrangement had turned a full circle. But to the greatest consternation of all, Baba Jang enlisted to jettison the principle that rescued him from poverty and hurled him on the laps of opulence.
He then turned to “God” for direction and choice. It was an alibi to buy time. At the appropriate time, Baba claimed that God had spoken to him: Senator Pwajok, his blood relation, was the anointed one! Had God endorsed nepotism? We were to find out later. Baba Jang had had everything all worked out. He had his eyes on the governors’ retirement haven… the Senate. So, he had to compensate the man he planned to usurp with the plum office.
Endowed with heavy war chest, Baba Jang took on the entire state in the belief that a PDP ticket was a confirmed cheque. All the aggrieved political gladiators, many of them from a faction of the PDP, massed into the APC. The opposition party became much stronger. The defectors were encouraged by the massive decimation of the PDP at the centre. “If money could not save mighty Jonathan, it could also fail Baba and his godson”, the defectors must have reasoned among themselves. Baba relied on the huge resources at his disposal to secure victory for his anointed son.
On that fateful day (April 11, 2015), Jang and his candidate called on money but it refused to answer them. Their main challenger, the Rt. Hon. Simon Lalong of the APC, with little change at his disposal like Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, had little or no money to call on. They called on the distraught and impoverished masses, the people’s power, and they answered them.
The defeat of Jonathan by the APC and the inability of Jang to impose his anointed son on the people of Plateau state, when combined, should enter the Guinness Book of World Records as the Ninth Wonder of the World.
Bon voyage to Lalong as he rides in the zonal train. And au revoir to Jonathan as he sails back to Otuoke.
