The Campaign Season

The political gladiators are at it again in Nigeria . It's campaign season and the political actors are in the spotlight. They are putting up the performances of their lives in order to woo the electorate to cast their votes for them. It is the season where friends can become the worst enemies in the twinkling of an eye because of differences in political inclination or affiliation.

It is also a period where bridges of mutual respect which have been built over a substantial period of time are often burnt or destroyed because of differing views as to who is the best man for the job of leadership or stewardship. This is rather ironic because the main political actors aren't the ones doing all the 'bridge burning' or destruction but rather it is their over emotional or over zealous supporters who engage in these acts.

Indeed, it is going to the extreme in expressing support for candidates who have mutual respect for themselves as they reealize that life continues after the elections. Little wonder someone said about politics in documentary that it is similar to professional wrestling where before entering the ring, the wrestlers usually express how they'd trash their opponent black and blue to the cheering of their supporters. For them whatever happens in the ring, stays in the ring that is except for those who leave out professionalism and take it personal by continuing or taking the 'make believe ' outside the ring arena.

All these dramatic acts such as trash talking and name calling are aimed at entertaing the audience and setting the stage for the 'main event' as it's usually called. The similarity being suggested between politicians and professional wrestlers is also important for another reason which I will point out later.

The campaigns are often characterized by digging into the past of the candidates by their opponents in an attempt to stumble across a skeleton or skeletons in the cupboard of their past with the intent that if any is found, it will be weaponised to discredit such candidate. The accusations that usually rent thr air at this time range from plausible ones to some that are outrightly ridiculous without any substantial evidence to prove such.

The areas on which searche lights for damaging material are usually beamed range from educational qualifications to things as petty as the fertility of a contestant. Another anomaly about most campaigns is the fixation on the opponent's misdeeds rather than on what a particular candidate has as a manifesto or agenda for governance as well as how he intends to achieve them in practical terms.

I once had the opportunity to be at a gathering which was intended to sell the candidacy of a particular aspiratnt to the attendees but guess what? The members of the campaign team squandered the entire time casting aspersions and bad mouthing the main contender from a rival political party. They only spent a few minutes to read out the key points in their candidate's manifesto which they failed to deliver in a convincing manner.

Funny enough when I tried to raise the issue about the approach adopted in wooing support with someone close to the campaign team, the response that I got gave me the impression that it was that style that a vast majority of the electorate are used to. Hence it's adoption. If indeed this is the case, then there's every chance that a candidate who would have performed better could lose support from the electorate if his opponents have a formidable media presence which consistently churns out misinformation or half truths in favour of the client.

If you constantly bombard people with the same information over and over again, overtime they tend to accept such information as being correct or factual even if they are outright lies. I have reached a conclusion that until the electorate have a chañgr in mindset, they'll continue to make bad choices when it comes to casting their votes. The present mindset of fixation on the intrigues and misinformation is birthing leaders who are elected on the basis of emotional manipulation of the electorate.

Things will change when the electorate transcend to voting based on intellect or sound reason. When the electorate start to ask the right or appropriate questions to guide their choices , then they'll get the positive change they desire. The emphasis should not just be on what the candidate has promised to do because we have seen over time time that a large chunk of those promises never see the light of day.

Rather the crucial thing should be How the candidate intends to achieve the content of the manifesto in practical terms and how realistic are the key points in the manifesto are in the first place. If this thought pattern is adopted, the electorate can easily discern the candidates that have workable and avhieveable plans from those who are simply building castles in the air. This way of accessing candidates will also weed out those who are fixated on regurgitating problems alone without proferring solutions to fix same.

Before I forget, back to the issue of the correlation between professional wrestling and career politicians. As a young boy I was a diehard fan of professional wrestling. I was thrilled by the theatrical performances of wrestlers such as hulk Hogan, Macho man , Shawn Michaels and the rest. Their performances felt so real. Innocently, As children we often tried to practicalise some of their moves despite the warning that usually proceeds their performances of 'Do not try this at home'.

The motivation for attempting to practicalise their actions was because we wanted to be as good as them and most importantly because we thought the stuff was 'real'. Real meant that we accesssee that the blows and kicks were intended to as much impact on the opponent in the manner in which they were 'inflicted'. Little did we know that the professional wrestlers were really no different from actors in movies excpt that for the wrestlers their acts were being broadcasted on live television and in front of audiences with no room for editing.

I therefore got a ride shock when I stumbled across a BBC radio interview with a representative of one of the professional wrestling outfits. The representative in the course of the discuss revealed that amongst other things before a fight commences, the winner was already known and the duration for which a particular bout was to fought was decided prior to it's commencement.

From that time onwards I didn't see the need to waste my time sitting down to watch full grown men dressed in spandex rehash preconcluded fights. One thing pro wrestling and politics have in common is that the 'actor' i.e. politician or wrestler as the case may be with better showmanship tends to be loved more by the audience. For wrestling this may be harmless as it has no real world consequences but for politics it could be disastrous if such candidate is no more than a political actor without the requisite ability or capacity for delivering on campaign promises and good governance.