According to Joseph Stalin, “People are like chicken. If you inflict inordinate pain on them, they will follow you for food the rest of their lives.”-
Above is akin to the political system of our people in Kogi State and this is the singular reason we are all at the mercy of politicians. I once followed Otunba Olayinka Braimoh to a town hall meeting where, in his usual way, talked extensively on his wealth creation agenda, telling us how poverty can be replaced with prosperity in our land. He convincingly gave practical and realistic approaches through which this can be seamlessly achieved and almost everyone in attendance was convinced beyond reasonable doubt, that if the idea is fully implemented, Kogi State citizens, will no doubt, live comfortably.
However, when it was time for contributions from the audience, someone boldly but ignorantly said, “As far as we are concerned, we are not always interested in the blueprints of politicians but believes in Friday’s night and Saturday’s morning politics. We were all startled but when asked to throw more light on that, he said, they only vote for candidates who come to see them on Friday’s night preceeding elections. Meaning that whether you have a good agenda or not, you will only get their votes on Saturday’s morning (Election’s days) if you give them money on the Friday’s night preceeding elections holding on Saturdays.
It is an established fact that one good turn deserves another and as one of the slogans of NURTW, “rub my back and I rub yours”. It is also natural and Godly to repay good deeds. Unfortunately, it is not always the same in politics, because of selfishness of few Individuals. Most times, the electorate know and can always identify candidates with good intentions but no matter how good the plans of candidate are, the greedy voters will prefer to canvass and vote for the candidate that they can get immediate benefits from not mindling what happens thereafter. This is the singular reason why our political representatives across board can’t be controlled by the electorate because their votes are sold as it is always a case of the highest bidder.
Electorate have the political power but have always sold this to politicians for peanuts. Our minds have been so decimated such that almost everyone no longer care about what happens after elections provided they’ve gotten something from the candidates before election. This is why we are not progressing as a people.
This unfortunate situation is what Olayinka Braimoh has come to correct. His wealth creation (STAT) agenda is all we need to grow together. With this in place, everyone will be involved in the management of our common patrimony and poverty will ostensibly be stamped out from our land. It is time to remove the veil of deciet from our faces and also break away from the well planned mental slavery we’ve been suffering from.
We will always continue to suffer in the midst of plenty until we stop the Friday evening and Saturday morning’s political mentality. No better time to do this than the governorship election coming on November 11, 2023. Let’s massively vote Olayinka Braimoh as our next governor in Kogi State and we shall all be happy forever after.
Musa Olumayowa Yakubu (MOY)
An Apostle of good governance writes from Abuja, FCT
