There is fever going on in Nigeria. It is a fever that has nothing to do with the Ebola virus but all to do with Nigeria’s general election coming up in the early months of 2015.
As such, Nigeria politicians are preparing for the big contest. By now, most of them are visiting their spiritualists for guidance. Some are recruiting tugs/miscreants for ballot snatching. Others are repatriating some of the stolen public funds stashed away in foreign banks.
Everywhere in the world, finance is the fundamental requisite for a successful election. But in the case of Nigeria, it has gone beyond comprehension. On 16/10/2014, Mr Muhammadu Buhari paid 27.5 million naira to his political party; All progressive Congress (APC).
Mr Buhari paid that amount for his nomination forms that will enable him vie for the presidential election on APC platform. That N27.5 million equals US$166,500 or £105,000. Mr Buhari often claimed that he’s poor; I think it will be noble of him to explain how he got this N27.5 million.
I have researched other country’s election to ascertain if such amount of money is paid to buy nomination forms. In fact this N27.5million is very close to the annual salary of the British Prime Minister (PM), which is £142,500. It will be unthinkable for the PM to buy £105,000 nomination forms for a job that will pay him £142,500 per annum.
It certainly means that one is effectively excluded from Nigeria elections if he cannot afford the initial millions involved. And so, those politicians that have stolen Nigeria dry will continue to rule and control her resources. Only they can afford to pay such amount of money.
Therefore, whoever pays that sum for nomination forms must either win the election by all means or die trying, because a lot of money is at stake? Honestly, nobody knows the annual salary of a Nigerian president. And that of the governors and legislators is unimaginable.
But it is certain that once someone occupies the presidency of Nigeria he becomes one of the richest people in the world. Then N27.5 million will be a good amount of money to gamble with when compared to the reward. And that is why elections in Nigeria will remain; do or die affair, until corruption is eradicated in the country. And only God knows when!