“The wise who refused to rule should be prepared to suffer the rule of idiots”- Socrates.
“One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors”- Plato
To begin with, In the present circumstances delegates are not to blame, but the general public who leave political parties finance to state governors and or moneybags.
In all our political parties no one becomes a delegate on his own. A delegate is often being brought in to represent a certain political Interest in his or her political party. It may interest us to note that delegates are often being handpicked in advance by certain political Interests in order to be teleguided during parties primaries.
Anybody who does not know that our delegates of nowadays from all political parties do not have free will or conscience to choose candidates of their choices and are only being influenced by the highest bidder syndrome needs to re-examine his or her understanding of the present day Nigerian politics.
Handpicking of delegates by state governors and or moneybag politicians is made possible because they are the sole contributors to political parties finance in our politics. He who pays the piper dictates the tune.
The reality of our modern day politics is that we have no say on who become candidates of all our political parties. Even the so-called delegates have no say. Our opinions have little or nor influence in primaries. We are at the mercy of our powerful states governors in all political parties in power because of their firm control of delegates.
Party offices are rented by state governors, party EXCOS are equally sponsored in like manner. In a nutshell, all party activities are financed by governors from the treasury not from their personal resources.This method enables our powerful governors control all party structures in their respective states.
In political parties without government moneybag, politicians play the role of state governors in party finance, hence control all party structures of their respective political parties.
For us to get it right we must all be involved in political party finance, irrespective of our economic status so that we can have a say in the decision-making process otherwise we should just forget about having candidates of our choices as flag bearers in the general elections.
We must device a means where all and sundry, irrespective of his or her economic status, will contribute to party finance. In advanced democracies where political parties are Ideologically-based not only the elected and appointed party members, but also the ordinary party members willingly contribute their monthly dues for the running of their parties affairs. In our case, there are instances of defaults even by both elected and appointed party members, let alone the ordinary party members.
In our modern politics, most electorate do not mobilize their individual resources to campaign for their respective candidates, but they usually expect money or gifts from the candidates they support.
Our present day individual attitude to electoral finance will continue to make state governors and or moneybag politicians dominate the political scene unless, and until, we are willing to retrace our steps.
In my thought, we can only get it right if we are able to address our political parties finance model.
For the time being “He who pays the piper dictates the tune”.
May God bless Nigeria!
Nurudeen Dauda
nurudeendauda24@yahoo.com
nurudeendauda24@gmail.com
