Fundamentals of 2019 Presidency

IN the build-up to the 2015 general election, the All Progressives Congress (APC) rested its campaign on three key pillars including Economy, Security and Corruption. No Nigerian disputed the aptness of that observation. Indeed, doing so would have amounted to a futile exercise. Bombs were reigning, not just in Sambisa Forest, there were reports of sleaze emanating from government agencies by the day; the threat to human life was present and apparent.

The APC campaign resonated with many as its slogan easily caught attention. A good number of voters decided to give a man they had rejected on three previous occasions, General Muhammadu Buhari the chance to lead the nation for once.

Three years down the lane, the verdict is out there, as the people remain the jury. Politicians would talk from both sides of the mouth, (they are already talking anyway), but the question before all is whether the nation is moving in the direction of growth and development.

The release of the 2019 election timetable by INEC meant that the countdown towards the next general election has surely begun. The time is this ripe to set out the prerequisites and fundamentals of the 2019 Presidency.

In 2015, the APC redefined the agenda from Transformation to Change. It paid off for the party. The herd instinct seized the arena as many bought into the campaign issues without any form of check-listing. The

intervening years between 2015 and now have, however, provided the opportunity for redefinition of process, procedures and the entire agenda. From 2015, year after year, citizens are being compelled to the reason of the imperatives of a fresh diagnosis of the socio-economic and political realities. They are getting clear that the ailments of 2015 have increased not just in size but in number. They are convinced that the new drugs are also needed.

Before we go further, we also need to establish certain prerequisites that would guide the next election of the next president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.  One is the need for common agreement on the fact that the nation needs a strong economy to sustain its ever growing population. That the economy as it is now is not just weak but floundering, and that there is the compelling need for debates on all fronts going to the next election.

The above have become imperative because it is now clear to Nigerians that no magic wand lies with just one man, thus the need for more ideas to be thrown into the public sphere and the compelling need for ideas to be

debated, scrutinised and dissected.

In 2015, when the APC claimed it possessed the magic wand to turn around the economy, end corruption and tackle insecurity, many compatriots chose to adopt the herd mentality. Not many asked the critical question; how.  Some three years into the tenure, we have all seen the deliverables. Even when politicians would speak to call the black kettle white, emerging statistics are kidding no one. Some seven million jobs have been lost, power situation remain at infancy, the country has continued to import finished petroleum products and the roads are in worse states, forcing many citizens to adopt the equally erratic air travel.

We should blame the INEC for failing to emphasise the place of debates in the electoral calendar it released last week, but the assignment is there for Non-Governmental Organisations and stakeholders. If the APC claimed it has performed, let it submit its records for debate. If the challengers have alternate ideas, let them bring the same on board. But we need this to start at the level of aspirants, not only after the emergence of candidates.

After agreeing to the prerequisites, we now come to the result of the contemporary diagnosis of our socio-economic and political trends. If the three-point campaign agenda of the APC in 2015 fetched it some good votes, the diagnosis this time has produced wider issues. Today, the key issues include the Economy, Education, Energy, Security and Foreign Affairs.

Away from high-sounding campaign issues restricted to the podium and rally venues, the build-up to 2019 should showcase politicians who can give us their ideas on the above issues succinctly and with precise implementation outlays. The candidates’ ideas must not be wrapped under some mystery, miracles or magic. They must be debatable at formal and informal settings.

Unlike in 2015, when the APC promised to stabilise oil economy, build refineries and make the Naira equal to the Dollar, the route to 2019 would fetch more questions than before, especially as citizens are coming to the realisation that the sub-themes of the 2015 campaign such as looting, incompetence, 16 years of destruction and the like are meant more to tag the opposition rather than achieve something meaningful for the polity. And if that is not so, the citizens would want to know why the acclaimed recovered funds have done nothing to help the economy out of recession and why the nation had to wait for oil  to regain its balance at the international market before we could talk of marginal growth in the economy.

Away from politicians who will come with sweeping statements, the 2019 process should be subsumed in questions, questions and more questions. The citizens must question the how and why of any policy the politicians throw up.