YESTERDAY: A LESSON FOR TODAY

AKOWE JOHN-DUKE SELIME As Nigeria prepares to elect her leaders, it will not hurt one bit to remember that a twisted ballot often begets dire consequences from the home to the streets across the entire land. But do we remember? In 2007, two active men took a decision whose consequence rattled not just their homes or states but also the entire country. One of them is a medical professional, the other an activist, one slightly older than the other, both vibrant and committed. That decision was to run for governor. Dr. Olusegun Mimiko then a minister in the government of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, resigned his cabinet appointment to contest the governorship seat in his native Ondo state. He did run the race but the electoral umpires said he lost it. He and his lawyers disagreed, and the rest, as they say, is history. But it is some history that is better not forgotten, for in it lies a lesson that may well teach us how not to behave. Across the Ondo borders, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole was pretty much the same position as Mimiko. Riding on the crest of his huge popularity as President of Nigeria Labour Congress, he had decided to try out a new turf: governing Edo state, should his people choose him. As in Ondo, the electoral umpires said he lost. He and his attorneys said he did not and went to the electoral tribunal, just as Mimiko and his legal team did. Both men have since become governors and are doing well in their respective states. But the concern here is not that the innocent has been vindicated and the medals of victory restored to their owners. The worry is the huge cost of that victory. It came on the altar of personal convenience and family peace. As the battle to reclaim their mandates lasted, a whole lot of things would have changed on the Mimiko and Oshiomhole home fronts. Each day would have come, and when?

The routine of the head of the family would have been terribly altered. The lady of the house would have realized that the man she loved enough to marry had been preoccupied with a more pressing matter, too heavy to ignore. She too would have fallen into the battle, willy-nilly. Time spent with the children must have been cut. Funds that would have otherwise gone to more useful causes must have been sunk into the mandate reclamation war. And like all wars, it would have also taken its physical toll on everyone. The apprehension of battle would have registered on faces even as the battlers marched on resolutely. Even fear for personal safety and that of family members may have crept in now and then. All those little things that make life worth living would have been re-ordered. There were other costs beyond the family. First, as the war lasted, there was the torture that the one the people elected was not the one governing. Development stalled. The people noticed that no one was looking in their direction. No one cared whether they lived or died; whether roads were in good shape or not, whether they had water to drink or not, and whether they were sickly or in good health. Were their children being properly schooled to prepare them for leadership tomorrow? No. was anyone doing anything about security? No. the state was at war over fraudulent election and far as long as it lasted nothing else mattered. At the national level the consequences of twisted ballot is just as telling. Unelected leaders may carry on with their petensions for as long as it takes to throw them out. They may be dressed in shiny borrowed robes. They may draw bogus salaries and claim sundry allowances. But the baggage of fraud hangs perpetually on them just as much as it weighs on the credibility of the country at large. The leadership of such a country will never cease to be a laughing stock in the comity of nations. Oshiomhole contested and won the election in April 2007 but he did not assume office until November 2008, well over a year later and at the cost of two court rulings, plenty of cash and time. Mimiko fared worse: his own crown came two years after. Another election is afoot. The federal electoral chief, Professor Attahiru Jega said some weeks back that his biggest wrong is not money but time. It may very well be so.

Indeed, many have argued that the timetable for the polls is just too narrow for any meaningful result to be achieved. But the biggest headache of the majority is neither the time nor the money; it is whether Nigeria can indeed hold any credible polls. Will the country make vote-rigging unattractive? Will the electorate look away from the fleeting offers of bribe from desperate politicians to vote as their conscience leads them? Will they vote any insist that their votes must count? Will the authorities do everything possible to break the jinx? Or will we walk the Mimiko/ Oshiomhole path again?