Politics should be about offering oneself for sacrificial service. But in Nigeria, it is characterised by desperation of actors seeking offices by fair or foul means, and inability of losers to concede defeat in the spirit of sportsmanship. These tendencies have been the bane of mainstream conduct of our democracy, perhaps owing – if only in part – to long years of military rule. The same tendencies characterise electoral contests at the level of sub-groups in the polity that ordinarily should offer hope for future redemption of the national culture.
The recent election in the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) is a case in point. Following that poll, a student of Federal University, Dutse, Usman Barambu, was declared elected as the new president of the students’ body. That declaration has, however, been controverted by Umar Faruk Lawal of Bayero University, Kano, who also claims the office. In media interviews, both contenders have separately dismissed the process that produced the other as manipulated and fraught with irregularities, while purporting to have the legitimate mandate of electors. It is a sad commentary on Nigerian politics.
For his part, Barambu said he picked up the hotel bills of about 80 percent of the delegates for seven days amid delayed accreditation that preceded the voting. “Faruk was among the people who proposed that the convention be shifted because he was aware that I was accommodating a large number of the delegates. He made that proposition hoping that I would be tired and send the delegates out of their hotel rooms, so that he could use that against me. But glory be to God, we were able to accommodate them till the end, although I am indebted to the hotels as I speak,” he told Sunday Punch. Among other things, he denied buying off some other candidates “because they had also spent much (money) to get to that stage,” and accused his rival of being the one who has been seen courting partisans in the larger society for financial support. On the other hand, Faruk alleged sundry irregularities in the election, including his rival’s camp purportedly doling out N20,000 to “charlatans” from whom he procured votes. He, however, confirmed that contestants footed the bills of delegates, saying: “Student leaders from the universities could not access funds because of the ongoing industrial action by the Academic Staff Union of Universities; it was we, the contestants, that managed to mobilise them, paid their transportation fares, and they also relied on the candidates to pay for hotel accommodation.”
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