How Challenger Parties and Candidates in Nigeria Can Overcome

Here are tips on how new political parties can triumph over leading ones in the 2023 national elections. Femi Odewunmi writes

We have had KOWA, Labour Party, YPP, and others, with the latest being Youth Party. I love the optimism these new political parties and candidates bring whenever we consider building a better society. It reminds us of how Nigeria can do better with leadership. That being said, I despise the work ethic (and in some cases naivety) that these fresh-faced parties and candidates bring to the task of overhauling Nigeria’s political leadership.

I can even argue that most of them are lazy, lusting after an Obama-style election success with a Jimi Agbaje work ethic. They are simply not ready. The first indication is how little effort these new candidates make when canvassing the votes they so dearly need.

It seems they can’t be bothered to understand basic things. First, legacy politicians will not simply roll over and let you win their seats. They fight, and if necessary, rig. Secondly, voter apathy is at all all-time high, so new candidates on the ballot need to give voters compelling reasons to go through the trouble of getting their PVCs, sacrifice their creature comfort on election day to come out and vote for you. Nigerian voters now more than ever need to be compelled that these actions are absolutely worth it.

I call youth politicians and new political parties insane because they keep doing the same thing in every election cycle, while expecting a different result….in fact, expecting a miracle. They show up a few weeks to elections, run a mediocre campaign and hope the streets to be full of voters (voting for them) on election day.

– No Polling data
– No Canvassing
– No lists of registered Voters with PVC status
– No concrete strategy to beat dominant political parties at their own game.
– Little appreciation for how grassroots politics works (not how it is supposed to work).

The cycle is the same, go into the elections naive, come out crying on social media.

Fresh faced politicians can learn one lesson from Nigeria’s startup economy; every challenge is a profitable opportunity. Several startups in Nigeria have done well, despite monumental challenges. They have done well, not by being lazy, not by hard work alone.. but by hard and (more importantly) smart work. They find success often relating to (and in some cases checkmating) regulators often struggling to keep up with the disruptive change these startups engineer.

APC orchestrated a significant upset in 2015 with strategic planning, long term canvassing and a stroke of luck. Why can’t our challenger political parties and candidates just study this successful political playbook and implement it? Even our apex opposition party, the broken giant, PDP, is acting like a JJC as we approach 2023.

As the months roll by, I do hope we can see more intentional parties and candidates. However, if the performance of the recent LGA Elections in Lagos and Ogun states are anything to go by, I wouldn’t hold my breath.

QUOTE

Fresh faced politicians can learn one lesson from Nigeria’s startup economy; every challenge is a profitable opportunity. Several startups in Nigeria have done well, despite monumental challenges. They have done well, not by being lazy, not by hard work alone.. but by hard and (more importantly) smart work

*Odewunmi is a Public Commentator and CEO, Creative Intelligence Group