And the winner is....
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- Category: Philosofaith
- Written by Aisha Umar Yusuf
- Hits: 684
No, this is not a Grammy, an Oscar or one of those showbiz awards announcement, it is just my peculiar way of announcing who will win my lone vote today, next Saturday, and the one after it insha Allah. Eight years ago when Nigerians were about to go to the polls, my two senior colleagues, Mohammed Haruna and Idang Alibi, had captured the dilemma faced by Nigerian voters in their separate column pieces. Mohammed’s piece was titled ‘Between a rock and a hard place II’ while Idang’s article was titled ‘Obasanjo: The devil you know.’ Their articles elicited a rejoinder from me called ‘Mohammed, Idang and a Roman criterion.’ This was in the run-up to the April elections of 2003.
Less than three millennia ago, a Roman general had stood before the body of his murdered friend and praised him. Though Mark Antony had assured Julius Caesar’s killers that he was only there to bury his friend but not to praise him, he actually proceeded to do just that. Among those notable praises was when Antony said ‘When the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept; ambition should be made of sterner stuff.’ The image of Julius Caesar weeping at the pains of the Roman poor is, of course, very hard to conjure, but that was the testimony of a loyal friend, and it moved the Roman mob to ‘mutiny and rage.’In my rejoinder of eight years ago, I had quoted this Roman criterion to argue that it did not matter if the contenders to the Nigerian Presidential throne had certain personality flaws that rendered them imperfect. All that we Nigerians needed was someone who could cry with us when we cry, before he wipes away our tears and solves our problems. Today, we do not need to look far to see the inescapable marks of suffering in the land. But we also do not have to look too hard to see that it is suffering in the midst of plenty. This is the typical mark of a system that has failed the generality of the people.
Some years ago, a friend told me how amazed she was to hear one Zamfara woman on the radio saying that the reason she had to support Sharia was because for five years she never tasted sugar because she couldn’t afford it. Then Sharia came, and along with it the Ramadan distribution of sugar and grains, and that was how she found herself taking her pap with sugar again. That incident really shook my friend, she couldn’t believe anyone could stay that long without sugar unless it was at the doctor’s instruction. This was over ten years ago.
But I had a similar experience recently when a colleague (sorry former colleague, I keep forgetting that I am now a retiree) visited his hometown in one of the northern states last January. Abubakar told me that when he went to visit his elder sister one evening, he was surprised to find the whole house in darkness. He sought permission to enter and was asked to come in from the darkness. On enquiring why his sister and her eight children were in darkness though it was early evening, he was told that the family had run out of kerosene to put in the lamps, and there was not a kobo in the house with which to buy even a candle. The sister’s husband, a state civil servant had gone for the evening prayer, but even if he were around his presence could not change anything unless PHCN brought the light back.
This young man told me he left the house totally depressed, after offering his widow’s mite to light up the house. But he succeeded in putting me exactly where my friend had been, a decade ago. With this level of poverty in our urban and rural areas, it is totally criminal to have leaders with no clear vision to alleviate it. We hear of incredible figures being budgeted annually, ostensibly for the country’s development, but we hardly see anything on the ground to justify such sums. One of the yardsticks I offered in my old piece was to look into a candidates past record to see whether he was deserving of our votes based on past performance. This was in response to Mohammed Haruna’s stand that a choice between General Buhari, then the lead contender and General Obasanjo then the incumbent president was a choice between a rock and a hard place because of their temperament and other attitudinal dispositions.
Idang’s position was to stick with Obasanjo by giving him a second term, because he was at least the devil we already knew, and we must not risk entrusting our nation to a saint we didn’t know. This was a curious position, to say the least, because we actually knew a lot about Buhari the governor, Buhari the minister, Buhari the Head of state and Buhari the PTF chairman. He was certainly no stranger to Nigerians. But the rest, as they say, is history. However just as I said then, I say again now let’s vote for people with our interest at heart. If the candidate has a past record of public service, let’s view it, what did he do in that capacity that benefitted the ordinary man? Does he seem to have a clear vision of where he wants to take the country? Is he concerned that despite our abundant natural resources, ours is a rich country of poor people?
Those National Assembly candidates, do they seem like the type that will get to Abuja and forget what they were sent there to do? Will he or she pocket their constituency allowance and do a token show of generosity to the masses, leading them to believe that he/she was helping them from his own funds, or will he/she genuinely serve his people by representing them well and using his constituency allowance judiciously? Whoever moves around Nigeria will see clear evidences of unanswered yearnings and aspirations isn’t this our chance to right the wrongs of the past? Let’s vote for selfless, patriotic candidates who have the heart and the will to do what is right.
It is quite obvious that our national problem today is one of poor leadership. This manifests in corruption, ineptitude and misplaced priorities, and results in poverty, insecurity and lack of basic necessities of life. When we record deaths on our roads daily due to bad roads and ancient vehicles; then have millions of youth failing exams because the educational system is in shambles; and we have people dying of preventable causes because the health system is also in crisis, then we really have a nation with nothing to show. And this is story of Nigeria today.
So as we get set to go to the polls this morning, we must resolve to elect leaders who can weep when we shed tears. They must be people with proven records of integrity. Thankfully we have an INEC credible enough to promise us real elections and votes that will count. The rest is for us to vote in the right people. And so on behalf of fellow Nigerian masses, I say the winners of our votes in the next three weeks are.......
God-fearing, honest and patriotic candidates anywhere in Nigeria.
Articles
And the winner is....
Category: Philosofaith Written by Aisha Umar Yusuf Hits: 684
No, this is not a Grammy, an Oscar or one of those showbiz awards announcement, it is just my peculiar way of announcing who will win my lone vote today, next Saturday, and the one after it insha Allah. Eight years ago when Nigerians were about to go to the polls, my two senior colleagues, Mohammed Haruna and Idang Alibi, had captured the dilemma faced by Nigerian voters in their separate column pieces. Mohammed’s piece was titled ‘Between a rock and a hard place II’ while Idang’s article was titled ‘Obasanjo: The devil you know.’ Their articles elicited a rejoinder from me called ‘Mohammed, Idang and a Roman criterion.’ This was in the run-up to the April elections of 2003.
Less than three millennia ago, a Roman general had stood before the body of his murdered friend and praised him. Though Mark Antony had assured Julius Caesar’s killers that he was only there to bury his friend but not to praise him, he actually proceeded to do just that. Among those notable praises was when Antony said ‘When the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept; ambition should be made of sterner stuff.’ The image of Julius Caesar weeping at the pains of the Roman poor is, of course, very hard to conjure, but that was the testimony of a loyal friend, and it moved the Roman mob to ‘mutiny and rage.’In my rejoinder of eight years ago, I had quoted this Roman criterion to argue that it did not matter if the contenders to the Nigerian Presidential throne had certain personality flaws that rendered them imperfect. All that we Nigerians needed was someone who could cry with us when we cry, before he wipes away our tears and solves our problems. Today, we do not need to look far to see the inescapable marks of suffering in the land. But we also do not have to look too hard to see that it is suffering in the midst of plenty. This is the typical mark of a system that has failed the generality of the people.
Some years ago, a friend told me how amazed she was to hear one Zamfara woman on the radio saying that the reason she had to support Sharia was because for five years she never tasted sugar because she couldn’t afford it. Then Sharia came, and along with it the Ramadan distribution of sugar and grains, and that was how she found herself taking her pap with sugar again. That incident really shook my friend, she couldn’t believe anyone could stay that long without sugar unless it was at the doctor’s instruction. This was over ten years ago.
But I had a similar experience recently when a colleague (sorry former colleague, I keep forgetting that I am now a retiree) visited his hometown in one of the northern states last January. Abubakar told me that when he went to visit his elder sister one evening, he was surprised to find the whole house in darkness. He sought permission to enter and was asked to come in from the darkness. On enquiring why his sister and her eight children were in darkness though it was early evening, he was told that the family had run out of kerosene to put in the lamps, and there was not a kobo in the house with which to buy even a candle. The sister’s husband, a state civil servant had gone for the evening prayer, but even if he were around his presence could not change anything unless PHCN brought the light back.
This young man told me he left the house totally depressed, after offering his widow’s mite to light up the house. But he succeeded in putting me exactly where my friend had been, a decade ago. With this level of poverty in our urban and rural areas, it is totally criminal to have leaders with no clear vision to alleviate it. We hear of incredible figures being budgeted annually, ostensibly for the country’s development, but we hardly see anything on the ground to justify such sums. One of the yardsticks I offered in my old piece was to look into a candidates past record to see whether he was deserving of our votes based on past performance. This was in response to Mohammed Haruna’s stand that a choice between General Buhari, then the lead contender and General Obasanjo then the incumbent president was a choice between a rock and a hard place because of their temperament and other attitudinal dispositions.
Idang’s position was to stick with Obasanjo by giving him a second term, because he was at least the devil we already knew, and we must not risk entrusting our nation to a saint we didn’t know. This was a curious position, to say the least, because we actually knew a lot about Buhari the governor, Buhari the minister, Buhari the Head of state and Buhari the PTF chairman. He was certainly no stranger to Nigerians. But the rest, as they say, is history. However just as I said then, I say again now let’s vote for people with our interest at heart. If the candidate has a past record of public service, let’s view it, what did he do in that capacity that benefitted the ordinary man? Does he seem to have a clear vision of where he wants to take the country? Is he concerned that despite our abundant natural resources, ours is a rich country of poor people?
Those National Assembly candidates, do they seem like the type that will get to Abuja and forget what they were sent there to do? Will he or she pocket their constituency allowance and do a token show of generosity to the masses, leading them to believe that he/she was helping them from his own funds, or will he/she genuinely serve his people by representing them well and using his constituency allowance judiciously? Whoever moves around Nigeria will see clear evidences of unanswered yearnings and aspirations isn’t this our chance to right the wrongs of the past? Let’s vote for selfless, patriotic candidates who have the heart and the will to do what is right.
It is quite obvious that our national problem today is one of poor leadership. This manifests in corruption, ineptitude and misplaced priorities, and results in poverty, insecurity and lack of basic necessities of life. When we record deaths on our roads daily due to bad roads and ancient vehicles; then have millions of youth failing exams because the educational system is in shambles; and we have people dying of preventable causes because the health system is also in crisis, then we really have a nation with nothing to show. And this is story of Nigeria today.
So as we get set to go to the polls this morning, we must resolve to elect leaders who can weep when we shed tears. They must be people with proven records of integrity. Thankfully we have an INEC credible enough to promise us real elections and votes that will count. The rest is for us to vote in the right people. And so on behalf of fellow Nigerian masses, I say the winners of our votes in the next three weeks are.......
God-fearing, honest and patriotic candidates anywhere in Nigeria.