2023: Why Nigerians should not repeat 2015 Mistake (Concluding Part)

By Ifeanyi Onyekere Mandela

There is every urgency for Nigerians to jetisson partisanship in order to rescue their country in 2023. It’s time to vote with conscience and the best candidate.

Since 2015, no right-thinking Nigerian would say we have fared better under the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led government.

Think about the crazy skyrocketing prices of essential commodities. Prices change hourly while your income is going the opposite way.

Statistics show that since 2015, more Nigerians have left the country more than ever before. What’s pursuing them?

We can’t afford to make the same mistakes we made in 2015 because insecurity has increased like never before. Billions of naira have been embezzled in the name of fighting insecurity. Thieves are being forgiven just because they joined the party in power.

And have you been to government owned hospitals, schools, industries, ministries, police stations? What did you see in a country where a soldier is the president?

Paying lips services to issues and sugar-coated promises.

Another reason the 2015 experience should not be repeated is the stabbing in the heart of democracy by our politicians. The 9th National Assembly brags that it is better to be a ‘rubber-stamp’ than object anything from the APC presidency. Journalists are gagged, imprisoned, intimidated, kidnapped and silenced.

A look at the judiciary would make you shudder as judges homes were invaded even at nights, court orders fragrantly disobeyed and judges got intimidated.

Have you forgotten how the Value Added Tax (VAT) was increased and hard economic policies made without a plan B? The US dollars rose from #150 to over #700 per dollar.

Where did all the money repatriated from abroad go to? And what’s the impact of the trader-monie and other conduits created in the name of empowering Nigerians?

We don’t need to talk about how we are more divided into ethnic lines like never before. And we certainly witness how incompetencies and corruption are rewarded.

It would be very difficult to quantify what we have lost in terms of lives and properties.

Nigeria has become a very huge crime scene. Those who feel discontented are forced to japa, and leave those without voice to the crime committed by politicians who are happy that able Nigerians are leaving the country.

The world has moved too fast in modern technology that if Nigerians got another old and ailing leaders for a bit, we’d sink into technological oblivion. We need someone with first-hand technological comprehension who’d channel these sharp minds into positive productivity.

Most importantly, we shouldn’t feign blindness to people who don’t know how to engage in issue based campaigns. We should avoid politicians who whip up ethnic and religious sentiments just to score cheap points. We should start learning how to be civil because it can’t fall upon us from above.

You can read the first part of the article here.