James Baldwin, the late celebrated African American novelist and polemicist, published a collection of two powerful essays with the title, The Fire Next Time. In his collection of poems, Ezenwa-Ohaeto, the Nigerian literary scholar, obviously influenced by Baldwin, warned that if Nigeria’s social descent, which resulted in a calamitous civil war in 1967, was not arrested, “the fire next time will consume even the air.”
The widely circulating media reports that the All Progressives Congress (APC) is plotting to manipulate the November 18 gubernatorial election in Anambra State brings to mind the apocalyptic warnings of such writers as Baldwin and Ezenwa-Ohaeto. According to the media, the APC top-shots is working hard to compromise the integrity of the electoral process, so that their candidate could be declared winner.
No one doubts that any attempt to tamper with the Anambra State gubernatorial election will give rise to serious consequences. The election is taking place amid tensions. For instance, the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB) declared that its numerous members would use all means necessary to stop the election. The group has been banned by executive fiat, but its members may have gone underground, as a major newspaper reported recently.
The IPOB members would feel vindicated if violence results from the election. They are likely to cash in on the situation to foment trouble. There is no guarantee that the trouble will be limited to Anambra State. It is rather likely to spread to not only other South-eastern states but also Igbo-speaking areas in the South-south geopolitical zone. Both the South East and the South-South geopolitical zones have seen enough unrest in recent times. The IPOB leadership had gone on a relentless membership drive. It had, in one word, become a law unto itself. The government responded to the situation by deploying soldiers to the streets of Abia State. Military action is no picnic anywhere.
It will, therefore, be tragic if any part of Nigeria is made more volatile through election rigging, with all the awful consequences. The unrest in the North-eastern area of Nigeria caused by the Islamic militant group, Boko Haram, has caused the country so much incalculable damage. The militancy in the Niger Delta, by young men and women agitating for both greater share of the national resource and greater political autonomy, has also cost the nation a lot. The security agencies, like the police and the military appear stretched because of the crisis situation in parts of the country. No section of Nigeria should be allowed to plunge into crisis because of the ambition of a few politicians. As a former Nigerian president has famously stated, no political ambition is worth the blood of any person.
Even though persons reported to be plotting to manipulate the impending Anambra election belong to the same party as President Muhammadu Buhari, it is reassuring that the Nigerian leader as well as Vice President Yemi Osinbajo are, according to the media, not part of the plan, and will stop it once they get to know about it. It is also reassuring that the leaders of both the police and the military have been reported to be strongly opposed to any move to use their officers and men to subvert the will of the Nigerian people as expressed through the ballot box. The present leadership of the Nigerian Army is on record as having zero tolerance policy towards its members who attempt to compromise the electoral process.
After the largely peaceful 2015 general elections, which saw the ruling party defeated, the first time in Nigeria’s history, it is absolutely unacceptable for any person to think of exercising the power of incumbency, or the so-called Federal Might, to subvert the democratic process. If ex-President Goodluck Jonathan and his Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had employed the power of incumbency so recklessl
y in 2015, Nigeria would probably have become a failed state by now. Both President Buhari and Vice President Osinbajo are statesmen, rather than extreme party partisans. When Ademola Adeleke, the PDP candidate contested against the candidates of other parties, including the APC, in the Osun West senatorial election last July, the APC-led Federal Government did not attempt to tamper with either the process or the outcome. Adeleke was declared victorious.
It is unacceptable that some desperate politicians in Anambra should secretly be plotting to rig the governorship election, and so cause confusion and violence in the polity. These politicians clearly do not believe in the anti-corruption policy of this administration. What could be more corrupt than to bribe electoral officers or scheme how to use state apparatuses of legitimate violence, like the police and the military to thwart the sovereign will of the Nigerian people?
These desperate politicians should be made to understand that election is not a do-or-die matter. A person who loses an election can be victorious next time. President Buhari contested four times until he won two years ago. Governor Rotimi Akeredolu of Ondo State lost four years ago when he ran for the state governorship on the platform of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), but won last year on the APC ticket.
To conclude, it is critical to remind desperate public office seekers that if they succeed in causing confusion, which restless youth groups can hijack, they may well be the first victims. As writers of note have noted over the years, the fire next time can consume even the air.
• Okolie, a trained sociologist and indigene of Anambra State, is a businessman in Lagos