This is not a time to keep the facts from the people or to keep the people complacent. John F Kennedy on 12th April, 1959, in his speech to the United Negro College Fund in Indianapolis said “to sound the alarm, is not to panic but to seek action from an aroused public.” And, as the poet Dante once hinted: “The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in a time of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.”
Understanding the nature of an election is the first step to winning the election. The governorship election in Ekiti State is of high stakes and full of mudslinging. It is such that some candidates have taken as a do or die affair. They have their egos tied to it and would want to prove a strong point to both their admirers and sponsors, so much that no sane voice can tell them to tread softly any longer!
Questions arising from this include why scoundrels should be successful in the political arena. Even if it is not unusual that morally corrupt individuals would aspire to rule over others, why should voters support such candidates? Would it not be a natural expectation that people should vote for the morally upright candidates? Do corrupt candidates have any advantage over candidates with integrity?
The questions beg for answers again and again. And, all else equal, they will stir the governorship election in Ekiti State come 21st June 2014. Several political parties are already throwing up different candidates whose credentials and the opinion of the people about their personalities are suspect. Since the state is the only one where the election will hold on the said date, all eyes are predictably focused on it and all arsenals are being geared towards it.
In the words of Kennedy, a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people. Every party throwing up a candidate should expect an open screening of the character and personality of their candidate if indeed they are the best they can present. This is where the All Progressives Congress (APC) will score a high. It is well-positioned as the party to beat; it also prides itself as an unbeatable party, given the level of acceptability its candidate has among the now discerning people of the state.
This, however, is not to say that the task ahead is an easy one. No. In most democracies the bad and dangerous men often find it easy to rise to the top of government. Those who seek political office appear to be eager to break the moral code that most people are willing to follow. The greater the power of the political office that a candidate is seeking, the more likely it is that that individual has no sense of right and wrong. And that of a governor is by no means an exception.
Also, considering the fact that merit in politics is rewarded by the possessor being raised, like a target, to a position to be fired at, other competitors and their sponsors are now seeing the incumbent, Dr. John Kayode Fayemi as a vulnerable prey and would persistently throw dirty darts at him. Questions like “Why should he aspire for second term, having run the first term successfully?” or lies like “Oh, he has a University in Ghana,” should therefore not be surprising at all. Politics, after all means different things to different people. To some, it is business that requires return on investment. To some it is science, to some it is art, yet to some it is a game that must be dangerously played.
But to the All Progressives Party the party which holds the ace in Ekiti State as of today, it is a process of decision making. And since it is service to the people, the party will not allow the state in its current upwardly mobile state to be preyed upon at this point and thus send it back to the dark days of anomie. Neither will APC allow itself to be provoked to act unconscionably or to surrender to any of the oppositions’ negative intents.
How then does the APC intend to win the election despite the entire inanity surrounding it? Surely not through lethargy or docility, same way it will not be through chaos or brutality. But by keeping it real and constantly gauging its preparation with some values, the party will rise above petty bickering and provocations. Most importantly, it is the personality and character of its candidate that will count most.
Other factors to be played up by the party include its achievements in government, it will get organised, put in place the right structure, while being very much aware of the opposition’s antics, upbraid the excesses of its followers, encourage the spirit of excellence and zeal displayed by members, meet the expectations of the people as well as latch on the external factors like the timing of the election and play by the electoral rules.
Taking it one by one and narrowing it down to the character and personality of the candidate, APC has gauged both the character and personality of Dr. John Kayode Fayemi and can conveniently answer all questions in the affirmative.
It is an incontrovertible fact that Fayemi, APC’s candidate, is highly civil. His character is sublime and his personality is positive. In the three and a half years that he has been in the saddle so far, no person or institution has been able to impeach his character. To the estimation of all, his personality also remains impeccable. He has made promises and has kept them so much that the people now regard him as a promise keeper (O wi bee, O se bee).
Like John F Kennedy, with whom he shares the same initials (JFK and JKF), Dr. Fayemi is not the Catholic candidate for the governorship seat, rather, he is the APC candidate for the governorship race, who happens to be a Catholic. Both Fayemi and Kennedy are Catholics and both live by the Catholic virtues. What matters is not an individual opinion of a person but the opinion of the whole community.
Ekiti people see JKF as a candidate of all times. They recognize him as a true progressive, they call him an unusual politician and they look up to him as a unique leader. He is pro-people, he is project-oriented, he keeps his promises, he is highly disciplined, he is dependable, he has national value, he is an international figure, he is a long-distance runner, he is calm but firm, he is fluent in speech and he is thorough in action.
So, what else does a party desirous of winning candidate an election, or the people that crave for a governor that will take them to the Promised Land, want that is lacking in Dr. Kayode Fayemi?
Fayemi surely deserves a second term in the interest of Ekiti.
Dipe is the Director of Publicity and Media of the All Progressives Congress in Ekiti State.
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