Is Nigeria’s Presidency Now Anybody’s Job?

POLITICAL NOTES

Next year’s presidential election is going to be one of the most interesting polls in Nigeria’s political history, and many factors are responsible for this. First is the north/south agitations over which region should produce the next president, a debate that has remained relevant and is already prevalent in the journey to 2023.

The second reason the election would be interesting is, because of the fact that everyone now believes they could be president of Nigeria and so, all manners of funny characters have since been indicating interest in the nation’s number one job, not minding the weight of the task at hand or whether they are even presidential in the first place.

Talking about the first factor, rotational presidency is not a constitutional demand but a democratic improvision peculiar by political parties, which is dependent on the prevailing situation in the respective parties. Therefore, while the agitations in all the parties, particularly, the two major ones are legitimate, it remains undemocratic to force what’s obtainable in Party A on Party B.

Their circumstances cannot be the same at every point in time. The argument that the APC must go South is valid, because the outgoing president is from the north. But that’s not applicable in the PDP, whose last president was from the south. After all, of PDP’s 16 years in power, the South had 13 years and more to itself, therefore, the party is open to zoning anywhere, depending on its winning strategies. Any argument to the contrary would amount to sheer mischief and indeed, undemocratic to force the hands of some to do the biddings of others.

The second factor speaks to the markup in the number of questionable characters supposedly interested in the presidency, not minding their education, exposure, character and general dispositions. Unfortunately, the current president appears to have made this possible. What everyone seems to be saying is that if Buhari, with all his inadequacies could be president, why not them? Well, true to that, why not? But, does it make the Nigerian presidency that cheap? Think about it too!