The 2019 general elections will commence with the presidential poll on February 19 and politicians all over the country are busy campaigning to catch the votes of the electorate, using all legitimate means to achieve their goals. Campaign billboards and posters are the traditional ways candidates from different parties employ to make themselves and their parties visible and also sell their candidacy to the general public.
This is the way it should be in a democratic environment. However, the sad news has always been that in the build-ups to any elections in Nigeria, the contenders are not provided a level playing field of competitive politics as it is the practice all over the world.
In most cases, political gladiators exercise territorial control by using every means possible to frustrate their opponents from reaching out to the people who have the right to decide their fate on Election Day.
Reports from some parts of the country indicate that some unseen hands are acting like demi-gods, using their influence and positions to vandalise and/or deface billboards and posters of those in the opposition camps. The crude methods of stifling or muzzling opposition have played out in states like Kano, Kwara and Lagos. The governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Lagos state, Chief Jimi Agbaje, has petitioned the state Commissioner of Police, Edal Imohimi, accusing the ruling party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), of using thugs to destroy his campaign billboard and sweep away his posters across the state. Consequently, the Police Command has set up a monitoring team to arrest anybody seen vandalising or defacing campaign posters or boards.
From Kwara came reports that thugs allegedly sponsored by the Senate President, Dr. Bukola Saraki, massively vandalised the campaign billboards of the APC governorship candidate, Alhaji Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq, with a catch phrase “O to ge”, meaning it is enough in Yoruba.
Information from Kano state revealed that the billboards and posters of the President, Muhammadu Buhari, were vandalised or defaced by miscreants who are being trailed by security agents in the state. The state Commissioner of Police, Yusuf Rabiu, has also deployed some of his men to strategic locations to stem the tide.
As the election period approaches, there would be more complaints by opposition candidates of approval being withheld from them to organise political rallies in different parts of the country. In the past elections and by-elections, state governments had used their powers to deny opposition the opportunity to erect campaign billboards or tear off their opponents’ posters. Additionally, they had prevented opponents from having equal access to radio and television stations owned by the state.
All these tactics would make Niccole Machiavelli smile in his grave. This disposition clearly demonstrates that those perpetrating this culture are intolerant of opposition, jittery of facing their opponents in a free and fair elections, and are desperately ready to do anything possible to hang on to power, irrespective of the people’s feelings and aspirations.
These practices are anti-democratic. With the general elections just a few weeks away, they should cease. The forthcoming elections, like the previous ones in the recent past, are critical to our survival as a nation. This time around, there is no prophecy of doom or break-up of the country staring us in the face as it was in the build-up to the 2015 exercise.
We remind our governors especially to remember that the contract they have with their electorate was sealed by the oath they took to give every citizen in their state equal treatment. Any action taken by them or on their behalf with the aim of precluding those in the opposition from enjoying equal treatment in the forthcoming polls is not just contrary to their oath of office but crude politics at its best.
We advise all those with the negative mindset to show restraint and give the opposition equal opportunities to market their manifestos to the electorate without any let or hindrance. Everything possible should be done to sustain our democracy. There is the need to imbibe the culture of tolerance. Nigerians and Nigeria deserve no less.
