Declassified Setting: Ethnic Voting In Nigeria’s Democracy

Circumstances routinely arise where people unconsciously expose their repressed feelings. The recent election is one of such situations.

Carried away by the euphoria of victory, some people have spurted out feelings based on tribal feelings, elevating their group over another. There are others who have been angry about the defeat and have resorted to malicious speeches against one ethnic group or another, accusing them of conniving against their candidate. They had taken to spreading words capable of instigating war. It is shocking to read them saying that one powerful group is attacking the weaker ethnic group, the majority against the minority, one religion against another  in retaliation for not voting their candidate.

Very few people had managed to control themselves, which I doubt beneath the façade,  they are boiling in resentment. Those who tried to maintain neutrality did not escape this intricacy when they granted interviews , you can catch  them  dropping skinny hateful remarks against one ethnic group or another. For that, the election gave a platform for revealing classified feelings which  people had been hiding for fear of offending their friends, or damaging the reputation they are struggling to build as an asset for future aspirations. Once in a private setting, such people can speak out whatever feelings they have in their mind.

Certain factors played significant role to influence voting behavior in recent presidential election. Religion and region did play while the sheer commitment to redeem Nigeria from People Democratic Party’s misrule, which had confined Nigerians into a dungeon, played a big role. Many Nigerians are anxious to prove the party wrong with its claim to rule the country for sixty years. Sixty years of anguish, of murderous sufferings, of looting and willful destruction. Nigerians had seen only suffering and agony in the PDP’s sixteen years. The thought of living under this calamity for another forty-four years has always left me with sunken heart and deepened anxiety.

But because of ethnicity people went to the poll and managed to vote a candidate who disappointed with unfulfilled promises. Because he is closer to the home. In Nigeria’s political context, one will not desert a kinsman for a candidate from the outer space even when you did not benefit from his regime since Nigerians have believed that a kinsman in government is a representative of his fellow townsman in carting away the national wealth. According to one hypothesis expounded by Bala Usman  “ if one gets a plot in Victoria Island or directorship or a Mercedez car or some share, one is getting a share on behalf of his ethnic and religious folks. Riding a limousine and vacationing in five-star hotel abroad is on behalf of one’s tribesmen who are starving but somehow vicariously in that car and enjoying the hotel comfort.” One mystification that people find hard to decipher is the hidden meaning of what  politicians are implying, this can mutely say something like “vote for me so that I can get contracts and build  million-dollar accounts abroad.  Vote for me so that I can win a presidential seat, so that you minority as my kinsmen, can drive the satisfaction when you do not have a square meal a day, and your children are suffering from chronic malaria, yet I’m eating a dinner costing million dollars in the expensive presidential suits on your behalf and that of others in religious brotherhood.”  

In the Southwest, the votes were fiercely fought although APC had finally won. The Yoruba people felt that they were under represented in Jonathan’s government who had failed to procure the promises he made in 2011. They played kingmaker during that year that saw him as president. Now, if Jonathan won, it would be his last tenure, who was likely going to install a successor from the north, in a dubious zoning policy by his party that did a devastating harm to the country’s unity.

Voters in the region decided to vote for the APC, a party if elected, would have their son in the second most influential rank in the country. APC means more posts and being adequately represented. The possibility of producing the next president after Buhari’s tenure has even further encouraged their support.

Religion has been playing role to influence voters in the Middle Belt, even though votes were closely contested in the recent poll. Voters might have hated PDP with all their heart but felt the need to cast their votes to a candidate they share the same religion even if they have suffered terribly in his hand. Some people in this region, like some fellow countrymen elsewhere, see a northerner as an oppressor and a symbol of born-to-rule. They should vote for a candidate despite his apparent failure. Like other Nigerians, are battling with so much problems.

However, not everyone in the region put religion as the basis for electing a candidate. States such as Benue where Jonathan had won in 2011 had gone to Mr. Buhari with the overwhelming Christian’s support.  Mr. Jonathan relaxed, making little effort to win voters’ support by disbursing projects in addition to political appointments in which an official might not care to initiate policies that would touch the lives of their folks despite the idea of ethnic and religious brotherhood. Taking it for granted to be elected on religious brotherhood,  Mr. Jonathan miscalculated the business and  took to churches to announce government policies,  an unwise move capable of sharply dividing  voters on religious line.  He has seemed to forget that some families from the region lost their members to the insurgency and religious affiliation cannot do anything to compensate their anguish which Mr. Jonathan was less enthusiastic to confront.

In contrast, votes in Niger state were blind to religion. Election in the state  was seen as a broom sweeping the dirty tactics employed by the PDP to divide citizens on religious line, and rule on mutual understanding in sharing the loot between Muslims and Christians. The vote there is a symbol  of national unity because a Christian candidate fielded by the APC has floored down a Muslim candidate aspiring to the senate after eight years  serving as state governor. The victory of David Umaru came with a hope for unity and touch for genuine democracy.

In the core northern states, the chief factor was insecurity, among other things.  People were anxiously desperate for change, they have got it badly for the last four years where the insurgency had blown off the peace and crippled economic activities. You can be amazed why Buhari had gotten such pyramid of votes from Kano hence you did not know how I have been living in fear, in austerity, with children glancing over their shoulders in the classroom. Many families have either lost a brother or father to the insurgency from the perceived wanton inability of Mr. Jonathan-led government. Voters who were diehard supporters of the PDP and voted for it previously, did not show interest in the party at the recent poll. Among them were bereaved  people nursing the pain of  the loss of a family member who went to the market or mosque and did not come back alive.

Many people like me felt guilty to cast our vote for PDP. When we looked around, we saw children who lost their fathers to the insurgency. You could not have the face to look these kids and tell them you’re sympathetic with them when you have voted the man whose inaction led to the death of their fathers. People really needed a man whose vote would not mean another four years of killings, showing little interest to tackle the insurgency until the last minute to serve as political advantage on the eve of the election. Some people who did not initially subscribe to the conspiracy theory of Jonathan’s involvement in the insurgency had begun to believe in it.  Muslims and Christians from the region felt that Jonathan did not give them the attention they deserved. People were prepared to vote for any candidate irrespective of religion or place of origin who is ready to redeem them from their tragedy. Just a man, whether a Pope from Vatican or an Imam from Mecca. 

Muslims and Christians stood for one another in the spirit of solidarity from the shared tragedy. It is simplistic and naïve to stand before the international audience and shout against the vote from states such as Kano when you have made no effort to help them out from their suffering You kept busy lining up of your pocket and expected these people to give you votes. What an ego? Hedonistic!

I may even say people had shown development in the process of one-Nigeria democracy to have given some hundred-thousand votes to Goodluck Jonathan whose heartland states gave fewer votes to General Buhari in 2011. Of course people in the north have learnt ethnic voting from some parts of the country.

No denial, religion was partly a factor. But it is a weak assertion to say people in the north had voted Buhari entirely on religious affinity. Buhari had trounced late president Yaradua who at that time had lately finished serving two terms as Katsina state governor and was contesting for the presidency despite the incumbency factor : the army, the navy, the police and the state treasury at the PDP’s beck and call.

Jonathan was looked at as ethnic representation of a certain group with the hurtful statements from some people who viewed him as our son in government. Secondly, he was seen as an anti-north for his cancellation of dredging river to the north, and especially for his reluctant attitude to deploy military might to confront the insurgents which had painted a bad picture on him to be seen more as accomplice than a man saddled with the responsibility for protecting their life and properties.  And of course it might be true that some people might derive pleasure when there is bomb blast in the north. For this reason alone, the teeming almajiri, the ‘trown away,’ the abokis, those incomprehensible and dense bodies had come out in torrent and full of emotions to cast their votes.

The policy of mixing up politics with religion was rendered useless in Kaduna, the home of Namadi Sambo who told northerners not vote APC because of pastor Osinbajo is serving as Buhari’s running mate. But many people felt threatened under PDP’s government with its Muslim vice president and hoped to feel more secure under people like pastor Osinbajo.

Buhari’s victory is seen as symbol of unity among diverse Nigerian nations, groups who were marginalized by Jonathan’s ethnic showmanship throughout the country. If there is any ethnicity at stake during the election, it would not be unconnected with the grudge some Katisna people held against Jonathan who assumed power following the death of their son. But this feeling might have flourished on certain factors.

There were people who vehemently attacked Buhari beyond just differences in political party and style of governance. They nurtured a personal grudge against him and the race where he comes from. You do not need to have a voice analyzer or polygraph to detect the strong hatred they say of him in their speeches. They called him a pedophile a fundamentalist who would convert the whole country into his religion. I could not help wondering if such people actually knew an iota of what Nigeria or democracy is all about. Some folks are suffering from schizophrenia.

I found it hard to cope with the thought of some people whom I initially accorded the respected for having remarkable intellect whom I later found were ready to believe in such idiocies and  began peddling it. Inconsistencies have occurred in their utterances to cripple their allegations when they voted Umar Yaradua who came from the same region and religion with Buhari. Where were their heads when they voted Yardua?  Did they not fear that Yaradua was a Muslim? Did they not think that Yardua was also from the mental universe of the born-to-rule society? We should wait to see if such hateful souls will take up their life when PDP presented a candidate from the north in the next election period.  I can only accept one submission if they had stated that they were supporting Jonathan as “our man” despite his obvious incompetence.

A fight for all

Nigerians had learnt a big lesson from the anguish and gnashing of teeth following the fuel subsidy removal just a year after Jonathan was sworn into office in 2011 and the theft of the Sure-P funds the following months, money which Nigerians had supposedly paid when government decided it could not afford to sell petroleum to its citizens at subsidized price. Nigerians quickly saw through the lie where officials stole the money meant for the improvement of their life.

This election is seen among the citizens as collective responsibility to redeem Nigeria from the cruel hands of some crooks who had been swindling the country for sixteen years. According to John Campbell, ‘’when and if violence occurs, it is between APC and PDP and not Muslims and Christians.” People had united against the PDP to save the country they saw as a crippled car climbing up to a hill while its peers and those who started after her had set the pace for travelling to the moon. Voters believed to come out to push this car forward.  Naira, dollars and pounds had exchanged hands but did not yield the desired result.   

Jonathan’s embarrassing attitude that threw the country to disgrace before the international community had also exacerbated his unpopularity. Some powerful few had built a wall that prevented him from the reality.  Those who misled Jonathan told him only about economic boost. But  they had forgotten that it was despite, not because of government, where ministers wore a wristwatch that costs a million dollar, a scandal that could cause a public officer to lose his post and go to jail in another country. His willful indifference has awakened the civic responsibility of the citizens where humanity is accorded respect that is  little better than a favour given to hindquarters. Incidents such as the missing girls, the massacre of two-thousand souls in the town of Baga, the missing of million dollars, pension fund scam, the fraudulent purchases of executive fleet, allegation of massive corruption in the military sector, all this had added up to the Jonathan’s tragic flaw.

Not entirely unmerited, Jonathan’s deserved to be whipped out of office, with the oil minister spending millions of naira for her personal jet, million dollars lashing on the executive tea and convoy.

Another factor that had damaged Jonathan’s image was his attitude to deny visas to foreign journalists who were on their way to the country to cover the election, while the few locals working for the foreign media were detained by the state security operatives.  But Nigerians were very determined to make their votes count especially with the card reader on their side. They have taken to social media and made the whole process a global issue. This made it very difficult, and the people made it clear to the rigging community, that any attempt to maneuver would have damaging consequence to the presidency.

PDP and APC are the same.  The same?

It is worth noting to those who do not see the difference between APC and PDP to have a check of their mental capability. Oh yes I see, senility is inevitable where mental and physical ability go down with the age in which a person’s  brain becomes less acute, confused and forgetful. After reading a body of books, yet the basic knowledge of law of logic has escaped someone’s mind in order for him to make a conclusion based on a kinda  of mischief.  No doubt that Buhari is surrounded by some PDP’s emigrants. Yet, we still have confidence in Buhari/Osinbajo believing that their body language and character would never suggest “stealing is not corruption”  as a willful indifference to the  theft of the nation’s wealth.

Buhari has many challenges to face, especially with the crooks surrounding him, caught between limited choice to work for the masses or reward those who funded his campaign. Buhari might fall out with the elite who sponsored his campaign but his victory is not entirely credited to a single society of men considering the staggering base support of the masses he enjoyed.  He should not be there to spend taxpayers’ money for his kitchen paraphernalia. Press the thieves to vomit the money they swallowed and fix such critical issue as power, insecurity, oil scarcity; issues that have been eating the soul of the downtrodden.

He should try to have confronted the fundamental problems confronting the country before he leaves office and put the whole processes on the track of stabilization in such an open way where citizens can have access to know how much fund was allotted to a project. This open government will help retain the truth of Nigerians, in case he left office with uncompleted projects, the masses shall be curious to see the projects done. In addition, open government is an option to Buhari where he will throw the fight between government officials and the citizens so that once an issue becomes public, it is hard for an official to brazen off the hues and cries that will ensue from the public. This will force them to cultivate good character since men are forced to believe in what they do not really believe in for the sake of appearance. That is, if Buhari chose to be a passive aggressor against corruption.

Character is like a shirt, everyone may choose to wear his taste according to his circumstances. Jonathan government left a huge lesson. Believing that Buhari ‘s unfriendly attitude to corruption, will make public officials become wary since in this regime there is no sign that common stealing is not corruption. It is the head the moves first before  the body follows suit. If his character and body language is seem to suggest ‘’stealing is not corruption’’ which  at best is fairly impossible and  at worst unlikely, then, I tell you even the most honest person will not stand watching everyone swimming into the sea and waits the wind to push him.