Katsina APC Guber Candidate Decries Lack of Ideological Politics in Nigeria
• Task politicians on issue-based campaigns
Francis Sardauna in Katsina
The Katsina State governorship candidate on the platform of the All Progressives Congress Party (APC), Dr. Umar Dikko Radda, has lamented that politicians and their political parties are not running an ideological politics despite the existence of democratic system of governance in the country.
He urged political parties to make their campaigns issue-based and convince Nigerians to vote for their candidates based on sound proposals of alternative solutions to the issues that are of utmost concern to the country.
Radda, who disclosed this Sunday in an interactive session with members of the Correspondents’ Chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Katsina State Council, said what Nigeria needs are ideological politics and credible politicians that will tackle the nation’s challenges in line with its democratic tenets.
He explained that for the nation to nurture and sustain its democratic system of governance, political parties and their candidates should embark on issue-based campaigns devoid of calumny and character assassination irrespective of their political differences.
According to him, “Let us base our campaigns on issues: what can you do to stop the problem, not that this party has brought this or has done that. We are not running an ideological politics in Nigeria, we have to, if we want to nurture our democracy.
“We have to start from the credibility of the candidates, what they will offer and their capacity as long as we are able to achieve that, we will get to where we want to get in the political process of the country.
“And we are not doing electioneering based on purpose-driven campaigns but rather campaigns of calumny, character abuse and what have you.”
The APC governorship candidate noted that those who are planning to use insecurity and other challenges bedevilling the nation to campaign against the ruling APC would not succeed “because people are quite aware that this insecurity started from the PDP administration”.
He, however, vowed to embark on issue-based campaigns and innovations that could contribute towards solving the challenges facing Katsina State and its citizens, urging politicians in the state to embark on purpose-driven campaigns not the mere fact that they belong to APC, PDP or NNPP.
The APC guber candidate lambasted politicians in the state who are jumping ship, saying they do it out of their own personal interest rather than the interest of the state as a whole.
Radda called on eligible voters in the state to consider the credibility and capacity of the candidates they are going to vote for irrespective of which political party, adding that the era of using political parties to seek support for opponents was over.
