Greetings everyone!
I've had the opportunity to lead at various levels, most of which were not politically based. Many were church-related, which I consider sacrificial leadership, and a few were at school levels where, though not politically inclined, a mini-election was conducted for me to be selected as a leader.
Although I'm not proud of this, after my last major leadership role, I vowed never to be a leader again except in a political position with significant benefits. You know that kind of scenario where you lead a group of stubborn people, get all the insults and criticism, have numerous sleepless nights due to various activities, and at the end, receive no pay apart from the blessing from above. Lol😂
Considering the type of politics in my country, if I eventually go into politics, there's no way I'm going to come out neutral or clean. I would definitely follow the ruling party and do things their way. I'm not shy about this, and I do tell people around me that I hate politics. If I ever go into politics, I'm surely going to do it the way it's done here.
WHY?
Ever since I became aware of things happening in the country and politics, the system has never improved; it keeps getting worse from tenure to tenure. I keep imagining how things will be in 20 years. The system here is so bad that the only way to balance things is to flush out all the people in charge and their subordinates. But is that possible? No way! The system is exactly what was promised in the Christian religious book: 'As long as the earth remains, corruption is sure to happen.'
I was an ad-hoc staff in one of the past general elections, and that experience exposed the election game deeply to me. The system is practically a game of who is smarter, and this smartness is what we call corruption, but it's totally accepted in the world we live in as being smart.
Why should I come out clean when I know I won't win or take a seat?
In the Nigerian political system, there's no such thing as the people's choice. Okay, let me put it this way: there are people's choices, but those choices only live in the hearts of the people and never make it to the throne. You might say it's a lie because people's choices win elections when the people vote for them, right?
I'm not going to use the previous general election to contrast this; I'll use the 2019 election. I was in the Eastern part of Nigeria when one of their Eastern sons was contesting as vice president. These people had the candidate in their hearts and truthfully came out in mass to vote. But guess what? It was their own people who came out and bailed us up with guns to manipulate results that were earlier counted.
If I'm going into politics today, if it's not the Jagaban's way, I'm not doing it.
Thank you.