The All Progressives Congress
has started with a momentum as a radical opposition party in Nigeria.
Relatively, it seems to have achieved some visibility nationwide, especially in
the media. It has also succeeded in antagonising the ruling Peoples Democratic Party on many issues
and has attracted many prominent politicians from the ruling party including
five governors and a former Vice-President recently. The party has also caused
sizeable apprehension in the National Assembly and in the process “harvested”
many senators and members of the House
of Representatives into its fold. As a political party that had
only recently commenced formal membership registration, this is no mean feat.
However, it must go beyond all
these if it intends to successfully displace the PDP and form government at the centre in 2015. Here are
three steps it must take urgently and two others that it must stop taking if
its desperation to upstage the PDP will be realised.
The first step it must take towards rebranding the party
will be to allow the big wigs to retreat to the background.Politicians like
Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Gen. Muhamadu Buhari, Chief Tom Ikimi, Mallam Nasir
el-Rufai, Chief Bisi Akande, Chief Timipre Sylva, Dr.Ogbonnaya Onu, Aminu Bello
Masari, among others are enormous assets to the party. In fact, they are the
party’s backbone and can be said to be the sources for the initial impressive
take-off velocity that the party has got. Though they bring on the table
considerable strength and following, they cannot be the face of change that
Nigerians need at this time. And I say this for every politician that falls
into their category; they are considered as part and parcel of the country’s
problem and so it will be difficult for Nigerians to trust these same people to
provide the solutions to the problems. Some of them have tainted
political past and are currently carrying one baggage or another.The APC must
get these men to willingly withdraw to the background and allow new faces to market the party to
Nigerians.This does not mean that the powers these men wield in their various
constituencies will not be useful at this time, but the fact remains that the
alternative party that Nigerians will have confidence in must not be driven
overtly by those who are believed to have contributed to the current
impoverishment that the people are suffering.
The second step will be to rid
the party of anything tribal or religious in their ranks. It may be pure
propaganda but the fact remains that many Nigerians feel strongly that the APC
or some elements within its fold may be promoters of ethnicity and religious
politics. That toga still hangs over the party rightly or wrongly. In Nigeria,
such issues matter. Other political
parties might have started using these two points as frontline
reasons for their negative publicity against the APC and they will likely
convince many people. Considering that no political party can form government
at the national level by winning votes from any one region only, the APC must
remodel itself along the lines of religious neutrality and inter-ethnic
inclusivity. More so, there have been several events over the last few years
that have made tribal and especially religious issues very sensitive. The
“deportation” of some “destitute” South-Easterners by the Lagos State
Government was interpreted by many as a targeted aggression against a
particular ethnic group. It was an avoidable gaffe linked to an APC run state
government. That feeling contributed partly to the poor outing of the APC
candidate in the recent governorship elections in Anambra State. Apart from the
half-hearted apology rendered by Governor Babatunde Fashola, no effort has been
made to remedy the public relations deficit created by that singular incident
through any targeted outreach to the families of those affected.
On a related note, the
seriousness of the party’s condemnation of the Boko Haram insurgency in parts
of Northern Nigeria is fairly unclear. As the insurgents continue to target
worship centres among others, they inadvertently provide potent opportunities
for outreach. To attract widespread support, the APC must be seen as a tribally
and religiously inclusive platform. As a party that expects to contest
elections and win by popular votes from the masses, one would have expected it
to rise and condemn every attack by insurgents and even provide relief
materials, by so doing come clean of some of the accusations from its political
opponents.
The third step the APC must take
is to articulate an alternative programme and market such aggressively to the
Nigerian people beyond its resort to criticising the PDP at will. The promise
of a progressive state and the doctrine of a social contract anchored on a
social democracy, all sound good but they are a bit vague for an ordinary
Nigerian to connect to. A greater part of the preamble on its website re-echoed
the daily frustrations and lamentations of an ordinary citizen. However, this will
not be the basis for the mass mobilisation for an opposition party that is
preparing to take over power. There needs to be very concrete strategies on how
the promise of change it promises will be actualised and operationalised. In
the “manifesto” on its website, the party promised seven cardinal programmes
though it listed eight items below the statement. How could such error escape
its vigilance?
The best way to sell the APC
quickly is to show the performance of governors currently serving under the party’s
platform. If it can show convincingly that its elected officials are already
delivering “change”, then it will be easier for Nigerians to believe that it
will do more at the federal level. Furthermore, it could start test-running
some of its policy proposals in the various states so that it can get concrete
feedback for improvement.
Nonetheless, there are a few
steps the APC must stop taking henceforth. It must stop over-antagonising
President Goodluck Jonathan. Its current intense antagonism and resentful
criticisms may turn out to be counterproductive. It portrays the party as one
that is only desperate to displace the President whether or not it can provide
an alternative. It is rather raising public sympathy for the ruling party on
the one side and on the other giving Jonathan the opportunity of realising his
mistakes early enough and making amends. The elections are around the corner.
At least the Independent National Electoral Commission has released the
timetable. Every party should go to the drawing board and do some rigorous
thinking and planning. If the APC feels that the ruling party has failed, it
should catalogue its failures, present them before Nigerians, and tell us why
its own party will be different. Period! Many political observers and analysts
alike are already feeling that the only reason politicians can defect back and
forth from the ruling party to the opposition is because there are no
fundamental ideological differences between the two parties. If this is true,
then people will begin to feel that they will be better off staying with “the
devil” they know. The APC should prove them wrong.
My final point will be to
suggest to the APC to caution its leaders and members to discontinue making
provocative statements that unnecessarily heat up the polity. Such actions lead
to confrontations with security agencies and do not add any electoral value.
This is a time to deploy
superior political tactics to woo the electorate. To confront a party in power
and hope to displace it is not a kettle of fish. The incumbent government may
appear incompetent in a way that has made many Nigerians angry. However, to
harness that anger into a positive electoral outcome will require a lot of
work. The APC must manage to pull off a less cantankerous convention and free
and fair primary elections to gain the confidence of Nigerians. Its
leaders must embrace the outcome of such elections with unity of purpose and
equanimity. That way, it will present Nigerians with a crop of untainted
leaders on the APC platform whose reputation and appeal will cut across a wider
spectrum of citizens beyond ethnic and religious boundaries. We are all anxious
to see them climb the podium.
Henceforth, every action or
inaction of the APC will count to support or disrupt its probability of
capturing power in 2015. The party should get one thing clear – that it is
possible does not mean that it will be an easy one.
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