I’ve stolen an idea which has worked elsewhere to calm the storm going on in my town; but first, the background.
One of the popular candidates campaigning to be governor came to me for support but I told him that while the state needed top-quality candidates like him, “my hands are tied because Bida also wants to be governor and I’m the secretary of the “think tank” that was empanelled by the elders and stakeholders to design a strategy of how Bida can get it.”
He then joked about how he’s also a Bida man and left me alone. You see, except for sell-outs Bida people want this.
Yet, the number of those aspiring to the gubernatorial seat from our ancient town is concerning to stakeholders. Personally, my opinion is that it is a good thing. Because (except for a few noisy spoilers) we can see top-quality from the parade of aspirants. And we are proud that these seasoned politicians and technocrats are from us.
Yet, there’s a problem if we don’t trim down the number. This has proven a very difficult task to achieve. Dr Saganuwan even proposed that they should support a neutral like SMA; his call appeared to be a popular sentiment but some people disagreed. No one wants to step aside for his brother. So the other LGs are counting on this pigheadedness of Bida to snatch the ticket from us.
Only yesterday (Eid Day), a friend came to my house and declared: “I want someone to write this somewhere. BIDA will not get to be Governor in 2023!”
Asked why he said: “How many candidates do we have? I’m a Bida man through and through. But if you’re recognized as intelligent and your intelligence can’t get you what you want then what is the point of your intelligence?”
No point, I replied.
I agree with my friend’s logic and became visibly frightened and resolved to write this today.
If you hold up the iconic picture the Governor took with all the APC aspirants and count the number of aspirants from each LG you would realize that it ranged from zero to seven in favour of Bida!
So how do we bring down this number to three or even one? Here’s the idea:
Gather all the aspirants in one room. Ask everyone to elect someone other than themselves as their candidate. The person with the highest votes is the Bida candidate. Then we can appeal to other places and LGs to help us.
This way, other aspirants would be happy that they chose the candidate of the candidates. And the person so chosen would be grateful to this electoral college.
Before you poo-poo this idea, it has worked before. Malam Muhammad Sagir, the then zonal chairman of APC B Zone told me that in 2015 when they wanted to elect the speaker for Niger State Assembly, they collected all those interested in a room as described above. That’s how Marafa came to be the speaker – in a very brilliant and peaceful manner.
By this, I appeal to the collection of our brilliant aspiring governors (from central bankers to former ministers to House of Rep members and retired Federal technocrats) that if someone can do the job nearly as well as you, then you don’t have to be the one.
~ Ibraheem Dooba
