‘We Can Do Better as A People’ Is Not a Curse?

Yes-we-can. That was Barack Obama’s mantra during the electioneering campaigns that brought him to the Whitehouse as America’s first African-American President. He shattered the glass ceiling that made such a feat impossible.

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He changed the narrative and shifted the paradigm and because he did, today America has a black Vice President. This has created the possibility for an outcome that many would have thought unfathomable two decades ago; a female, and yes – black, President on the not-too-far horizon. All because they believed THEY CAN and they worked at it.

Yes-we-can is not a mantra for the dubious. It is a soul-elevating sing-song for the altruistic that desire the best outcome for the greatest number in the polity. Not for those who deliberately create shortcuts for subterfuge and unfair contests.

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For those, they read the precepts of Niccolo Machiavelli – that you can engage in evil when it would be necessary for political expediency. That the end justifies the means. If you find this unbelievable, read his work The Prince.

Yes-we-can is not for the faint-hearted sponsored by a money-bag who controls his/her every move and decision in the political space. Even when it is clear that the other choice is going to be more beneficial to the polity and guarantee a better future for coming generations, such ones vote against it anyway. Oga’s directive.

Those are the ones that would rather TV crews are not allowed to broadcast the scene and wonder why social media cannot be abolished.

Yes-we-can is never a good choice for those whose only motivation is of the pecuniary kind. The Ghana-must-go bag advocates and recipients. Once the bag is delivered and certified full of the expected banknotes, scruples can go to hell. What does oga want? Tell him to consider it done!

There is also another platoon for whom yes-we-can is anathema. Those are they that are shameless and do not bother about how they are perceived by a society that smells the ordure they carry about. They can vote for anything and any position on any matter even if it sinks their country or community. For them occupying the position is all that counts.

Members of one other group continuously calculate their personal agenda and are ready to sell both today and the future of all of us for that goal. For them, it doesn’t matter if that calculus goes wrong eventually because they have used the wrong variables.

They have a single-minded focus on that personal goal. The fact that they have been sold short before after selling out and the signs that they would be left out in the cold again are visible doesn’t deter them. Yes-we-can for positivity now is not for them even though they know better.

A repudiation of the yes-we-can philosophy is a defeatist mindset that takes a nation backward. The alternative is also true. When you choose a can-do attitude, your altitude goes above the skies.

As Richard Branson just proved. How can one man just dream of building a spacecraft that will shortly be taking people on commercial flights to space and back? Is he mad? Does he know the resources that wealthy nations spend, the technology involved, and the extensive technical astronaut training that takes place?

What will anyone go to do in space anyway? Does he want to die? Besides does he know that no single individual has done this before? Those are some questions people asked years ago when Branson first announced his new venture.

But he achieved it Sunday last week 11th July 2021. He used himself as ‘Guinea pig’ and now the first customers have already booked. That’s how yes-we-can work.

If Richard Branson was a Nigerian, even wanting to use his money as he has done on this record-breaking project, our National Assembly would have voted ‘no’. As they did last week on critical aspects of our long-awaited Electoral Bill. And they would have had loads of vacuous reasons why it cannot work ‘now’.

Reasons would have varied from the novelty of it, where Branson hails from, which political party affiliation he has, must the launch be from America when he is British, why can’t he build a spaceship large enough to take one person from every state or tribe? NCC approval? Ad infinitum. Ad nauseam.

It was laughable watching our National Assembly last week debating the desirability and practicability of electronic transmission of election results as a way to make en route alterations impossible. Did I say laughable? Not the outcome, for that, was tragic! It is the inanities canvassed as the reasons for the outcome – ‘no’ massively overtaking ‘yes’ – that was laughable.

The outcome made you want to cry. After all the gains we have made in the application of technology that we even overtook some western countries in putting to use new discoveries they made, now this!

In 2008, that is thirteen years ago, I was involved in a pan-West African project which involved a lot of traveling. We were buying tickets online and using computer printouts.

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I recall a white South African in our team complaining bitterly that in South Africa they were still processing tickets manually and tickets were written by hand whereas Nigeria has gone beyond that. I felt proud.

We adopted mobile banking quite early and today, the CBN policy on expanding banking services has brought banking to the remotest village with POS services widespread and functional. The wide use of social media is further evidence of the ubiquity of telecom services nationwide.

Even bandits and kidnappers in thick forests depend on ‘electronic transmission’ for their devilish effectiveness. It may not be 100% but the little shortfall is manageable through innovative thinking and proactive actions.

But when it comes to transmission of election results, ah, that’s another matter. So says our elected representatives in the National Assembly. Majority of them. No one is fooled by this outcome that tells the world we prefer to live in the past because it affords us the opportunity to achieve outcomes of dubious quality.

Now that it has got to the use of a technology that would help guarantee that results are not altered between a polling station and a collation center, members of our parliament say NO. They are not so sure they and their party would return to power if some loopholes are not left for some ingenious arithmetic and what Fela calls government magic. The more you look the less you see!

The spouse of the one that told Edo people via a video in September last year that he is the ‘leader of all democrats’ also voted ‘no’ despite the fact that her’s is the most cosmopolitan state in the Federation. Perhaps accurate electoral results are anathema to their 2023 electoral calculus.

So did my brother from Edo North. I hope he too can tell Edo North voters why he voted the way he did. Some people are snidely remarking that it could be part of the rehabilitation schemes for a godfather somewhere near Edo University. A report card of sorts for good behavior on parole.

How is it possible for senators from the same state of Edo to vote differently on a matter such as this? They say it is a technical capability issue but what we see is partisan!

For telecoms network that wasn’t installed by a political party, how come the areas with low coverage are only the constituencies of one party? And if they defect, suddenly the network gets better?

Could it be that one party thinks the accuracy of electoral results will reduce their chances and the other agrees with them knowing that the loss of the former will be their gain? Is there a third way in this that benefits Nigeria? Is there anything the government can do that will benefit all?

The Telecom Companies have even contradicted the National Assembly now asserting that they have the capacity. The Independent National Electoral Commission has also affirmed that it has the capacity to transmit election results from remote areas.

Even someone no other than the former INEC Chairman – Prof. Attahiru Jega – has posited that some people want to undermine the integrity of future elections in Nigeria by permitting electronic voting but precluding electronic results transmission!

I think there is a third way. We must not take every national issue as a zero-sum game. Everyone can be a winner if we take a different option that addresses the fears and resolves the current obstacles that some are using as the basis for their positions.

What if we decide to help the telecom companies complete their national coverage by reducing their taxes by the amount required to achieve that aim? Apart from electoral results transmission purposes do those Nigerians in the few areas without coverage not deserve telecom services as of right? What has these MP’s done to call attention to that need?

Has any of them used his/her gargantuan constituency project funds to pursue that objective? Why not ride on the back of this requirement to get them telecom services and kill two birds with one stone?

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) will no longer be independent if it has to DEPEND on another body – NCC – to enable it to make decisions, especially regarding the electronic transmission of results.

All a government in power would do is to tell NCC what to say, for good or for ill and INEC would be hamstrung. That is unacceptable. The Bill (not ACT yet) we have now can still be amended before the President’s imprimatur subsequent to it becoming an Act and a law of the land.

The National Assembly should also know that people are watching and their history is being written. There is something called legacy. It should be important to them as it is to the President and Governors.

The videos of voting on INEC commissioners last week where there was no ‘aye’ but overwhelming ‘nay’ but the “AYES had it” are available online as a permanent video record. We still know and respect the courageous Senate President and Senators that killed the third term agenda years ago.

History remembers those who pushed the ‘five fingers of a leprous hand’ scenario. One of them even proudly told a journalist then that he was the first to propose that all the parties nominate the then Military Head of State as their candidate. He is from the middle belt and is still in the Senate today.

There was one, a former governor from a state bordering Borno that said a mere mention of June 12 should be considered a crime in those heydays following the annulment. In his very presence, June 12 has been declared democracy day and MKO Abiola was honored by the President.

He is still called Distinguished and perpetually ‘wins’ his Senate seat. But for the microphone that is always switched off, we would be hearing him snoring during plenary. We remember the Senate President of the 8th Senate and the senators of that era and the roles they played. History will remember this 9th Senate too. For good or for ill.

We can do better than this. Those who say so are not condemning his country or government. They are believers in its greatness and limitless possibilities. Saying that the security situation is bad and the government is not doing enough, for instance, stems from the belief that the government can do better.

It would be a vote of no confidence in it is said that this is the best the government can do as citizens are dying and a full Army General is killed by bandits on our highway. We can do better than this. And should.

If Major General Ahmed was killed in some countries, even third world like ours, they would have ransacked those forests and environs and smoked out those bandits and other criminals in that area in one day!

We should get tired of paying condolence visits to families of our countrymen murdered in broad daylight. Condolence messages cannot be a replacement for security. We can do better. And this is not a curse!

Benin City, 18th July 2021 – Austin Isikhuemen 

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