Nigeria as a country has a listening problem. It is often the case here that when people speak, no one listens. When the masses speak, those in power do not listen and when those in power speak, the masses do not listen either. So, there is a massive communication problem, a mammoth communication gap as it is.
For those who occupy public offices, this crisis of communication is especially costly as it feeds a perception problem which in turn feeds a crisis of confidence.
A den of demagogues
There are many influential people in Nigeria, some of them public figures, others more private, who either publicly spew hate or privately inflame others. Many of these people because they occupy positions of authority, use their positions to seek to mold others. And depending on their minds or motives, they go very far.
Just like those who publicly share their belief that death is the only fitting punishment for a young woman who supposedly blasphemed religion, there are many who would rather keep their thoughts private, or just restricted to a small group of people, but are just as dangerous. In fact, as dangerous as scorched snakes.
Half-baked ideologues
In Nigeria`s political circles where politicians jump from one party to another with little care for principles or prior commitment to their constituents, ideology is a strange topic. Yet, for many of them, when they recover to snatch any form of clarity from their almost constant state of confusion, they know to say all manner of things to excite their supporters and explain away the confusion they created in the first place.
This particular trait of Nigerian politicians has recently come to the fore as Nigeria continues to go full throttle in its quest to get to the general elections scheduled for 2023 in one piece.
The conversation has recently centered around the decision of the All Progressives Congress which is Nigeria`s ruling party to draw both its presidential and vice presidential candidates from the same religion.
A fraught furore
In the mouths of many Nigerians lie a sour taste that will surely linger long after President Muhammadu Buhari leaves office. That taste will surely be made up of a lot of disappointment.
In 2015, faced with the cataclysmic failure of the Peoples Democratic Party and President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan to steer the country towards calmer waters, Nigerians pitched their tents with the All Progressives Congress amidst the party`s effusive promises to fix the country.
Seven years and a renewal of the mandate first given President Muhammadu Buhari in 2015 have now gone by, yet, very little has changed. If anything, things have degenerated to leave the country in a difficult situation.
The Muslim-Muslim menace.
It now appears that it is the All Progressives Congress that must take responsibility for the unprecedented division rocking the country especially along religious lines.
Already, so many things have happened in the country this year to set the country on edge. There was the burning of Ms. Deborah Samuel in Sokoto in on May 12 over blasphemy and another blasphemy-related burning of 30-year-old Ahmad Usman on June 4, 2022 in Abuja.
With these flames that have risen to lick away at the fragile fabric of Nigerias unity, why has Nigerias ruling party chosen to break tradition and go for a Muslim-Muslim ticket with no convincing reason? And why have some of those who ordinarily should protest waved away the mounting concerns over such a ticket?
The answer is to be found in convenience thickened by cowardice. It has afterall always been the favourite recipe of those who always fail to speak up for an ailing country when it matters most.
Kene Obiezu,
keneobiezu@gmail.com
