A warmer understanding of gathered multitudes is needed by politicians, recommends Monday Philips Ekpe
I may not be able to join the enthusiasts and supporters of Mr. Peter Obi to prophesy that the presidential standard bearer of Labour Party (LP) will occupy Aso Rock Villa come May 29, 2023. Neither do I blame them. The truth is that even those who are paid to put political opponents down by all means and who have been exploiting real and imagined loopholes around Obi to smear him do know in the recess of their souls that the ripples caused by the former governor of Anambra State so far are unexpected, spontaneous and volcanic and that they can no longer be ignored.
Analysts who have dismissed him as a mere social media tiger, a structure-less politician who would be taught bitter lessons in the forthcoming general election, have a number of options open to them: One, remain fixated with their prediction; two, eat their words and wait for the outcome of the polls; three, join those changing their minds after initially writing him off; and, four, reset their psyche to a neutral mode while peeping into ancient and contemporary history around the world to see if there are examples of personalities like him who have successfully shattered barriers to clinch coveted positions and prizes.
The man most likely never saw that he would become the folk hero he is today when he jumped the ship of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) days before its presidential primary. I’m sure that the graduate of philosophy sat himself down and, in a moment of illumination, smelt a certain defeat awaiting him at the main bowl of the Moshood Abiola National Stadium in Abuja and decided to look elsewhere for the actualisation of his ambition to lead Nigeria. Looking back now, it wasn’t a reckless step. Some have argued that as the party’s vice-presidential candidate in the 2019 elections, he was better placed to either pick the top ticket or end up with the second position. Well, he also read the chemistry and physics of that time and knew clearly the odds against him. Never mind the probabilities, he took his chance and the rest is still unfolding.
I have chosen to tamper whatever enthusiasm I have with caution because, apart from ethical demands, experience has taught me some things. In 1983 during the build up to that year’s election, the Presidential Candidate of the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo, came to my town in a helicopter to campaign. When he saw the teeming crowd that received him, the sage was overwhelmed with joy and great expectation. He was so moved that he said he didn’t have to spent too much time there because he was already convinced about his hosts’ love, loyalty and belief in the UPN doctrines. As a young adult, I managed to become one of the party’s agents at the polling units that year. Needless to say, Awo’s animated reception never translated to any useful electoral value.
Let’s also not forget a similar thing that happened to the late Owelle Nnamdi Azikiwe who was Awolowo’s counterpart in the Nigerian Peoples Party (NPP). Some newspaper reports put the number of the people who welcomed him to his rally in Minna, Niger State at over one million, arguably one of the largest during the 1983 political campaigns. It was also possible that the great Zik of Africa was filled with nostalgia, having been born in Zungeru, a town in the state, some eight decades earlier. But in a matter of weeks, it became clear that the mammoth crowd was there for reasons other than wanting ‘their man’ in Dodan Barracks, Lagos.
I freely advise the politicians jostling for various offices that they should include in their teams, mob or crowd experts if they haven’t done so yet. That would save them plenty of time, energy, money, other resources and even emotional trauma. Their strategy units that have concentrated on crowd-renting can do more by getting to understand the psychology of crowds as the campaign trains move from one location to the other. Somehow, tides are turning. The mindsets of the electorate can’t be trusted to remain as they were in previous republics. Membership of religions, ethnicities, regions and states may be static but the worlds around are changing for good or ill. The political class has for long done a cruel job of keeping Nigerians divided along those nebulous lines for its own self-aggrandisement but, again, all that can be toppled.
In the course of celebrating the nation’s recent independence anniversary, one party, LP, stood out in publicly maximising the occasion to achieve greater visibility and, hopefully, acceptability. In moves reminiscent of the ‘EndSars’ protests of 2020, people trooped out in some capital cities across the country and elsewhere, in their hundreds and thousands, in support of Obi and his running mate, Dr Datti Baba-Ahmed. Prof. Pat Utomi, one of the party’s leading lights, said that those parades were actually not planned by LP. If Utomi is to be believed, interesting times lie ahead. For all ‘Obi-dients’, however, this doesn’t call for rolling out drums. No, not just yet.
For quite some time, I’ve been explaining to my friends, especially the ones outside, who have been sending me videos of the open ‘love’ and frenzy that tend to follow Obi around. I realise that some of them are not even willing to listen to any view that draws attention to contending political variables. Some have since concluded that only rigging can stop Obi from being declared winner next year. Surely, such stance has no basis in any rational analysis. Conclusions that are not directly derived from valid premises are on their own and have no place in logic. Remarkably, however, political outcomes are not always logical products. Strong sentiments can shift to unlikely candidates. Protest votes can occur for whatever reason. And, miracles do happen. Aha! For good measure, seekers of supernatural interventions have never been in short supply here. This last option has become inevitable as the choices available to the long-suffering people of Nigeria are disappearing rapidly.
There’s no doubt that huge, jubilant crowds make for good optics, especially when surrounded by well-entrenched interests and rivals. But all Nigerian politicians should be interested in putting the current electorate behaviour in proper perspective. In my opinion, the country is back to the months leading to the 2015 polls when a chunk of crowd energies eventually coalesced around President Muhammadu Buhari, then candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), largely for his ascribed competence and capacity. One main difference today is that the venom of the demons tormenting the citizenry is deadlier than what obtained eight years ago. Then the most visible threat to national security and cohesion was Boko Haram, limited only to a section of the country. The economy was also beginning to falter, with its vital indices going downwards. Sadly, those challenges have now assumed seeming invincibility. And the people are, at the moment, desperately in search of salvation.
Who or what will save Nigerians now? Both online and on ground, as individuals and groups, the citizens pour out their hearts, looking for messiahs. Will their yearnings and lawful desires mean anything to the political elite this time? Will crowds truly matter beyond being used as tools to intimidate competitors? Or, are they condemned to being sheep without true, selfless shepherds? Many questions still…
Dr Ekpe is a member of THISDAY Editorial Board
