Vote buying. Credit: the Punch
May I use this opportunity to congratulate the ever hopeful people of Ogun State on the occasion of their harvesting their own rights from political spendthrifts? This is election season and politicians are busy outspending each other.
Pray, what are they spending on?
All those things they ought to have provided for the people in the first instance!
At least, I know four gubernatorial candidates most of whom could be said to be serial contenders. What most of them do is that they try their luck during every election season.
However, the people have wisened up!
Won ti sa pra pra!
What they do is, ‘B’omode o j’obi,
Agba o j’oye!’
That’s if the people aren’t empowered, you can’t be elected!
And in Nigeria, we’ve learnt that the people are so cheap. The other day, people were being empowered with a miserly sum of two hundred and fifty naira in a nearby state’s primary elections.
If two hundred and fifty naira is not up to a dollar in value, is it not logical to conclude that those people are not worth up to one dollar?
Now, the politicians and their godfathers have amassed so much wealth that their war chests for elections are generally a miserly percentage of what most of them have stolen from government coffers. Those who do not have money approach the willing godfathers to sponsor their elections.
On their parts, the wily godfathers box the contenders into a murderous corner. They demand for cabinet slots of such juicy posts as finance, works, etc. They even choose the revenue collecting chief for the state.
In fact, it’s like selling the state!
So who am I not to congratulate Ogun indigenes on this occasion of the egungun festival held every four years?
But then, they should remember that, ‘odun egungun a tan, omo alagba a wa fi ekuru j’eko’.
After selling their future, at least, for four years, hunger for the dividends of democracy will set in.
But then, it might just be too late!!!
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