Osun And The Gospel of Parliamentary Democracy

By design, parliamentary democracy is meant to encourage quicker legislative action, primarily because the executive branch is a product of the support of the legislative branch which in turn “includes members of the legislature.” In an environment like ours where ethnic, racial, even religious and ideological animosity has been elevated into statecraft, parliamentary practice serves as an effective instrument for direct political participation and even distribution of power. Also, the likelihood of a drastic drop in the rush for; and friction at the centre under parliamentary practice is high. And, apart from its ability to carry along with it a spectacular increase in political activities across the state, Aregbesola’s innovative revolution is most likely to generate robust discussions on the way forward for a democratic Nigeria.

Quite clearly, it is because we have failed to test our laws that dysfunctional political system has become commonplace scandal in Nigeria. Contrary to projections, parliamentary system runs the risk of becoming a mere fig leaf by which Nigerians seek good governance and socio-economic liberation  unless  the  fine issues  of its cumulative impact are clearly defined. In any case, this is where the involvement of critical stakeholders likes the youth, traditional institutions and civil society groups in exploring all the opportunities that  an election of this nature and timing presents comes in. Church  and  State must also collaborate in the overall interest of the electorate’s exploring the  strengths and inspirations  that  the exercise will be throwing open. Essentially, political parties must  read the signs right by going  into  the contest with  their  best, votes-worthy candidates.

Walter Bagehot famously describes ability to do “what the people say you cannot do”  as “the greatest pleasure in life.”  Like a field of driven snow, Osun  governorship election is  less than a year away! Agreed! No two elections are the same. However, the tragedy of victory is that success at the January 2018 poll may not necessarily translate into  victory  on September 22, 2018 unless some purposeful political reengineering is done where necessary. On the other hand, the fact that All Progressives Congress (APC) got it wrong on July  8, 2017 does not mean that all hope is lost for the party. All the more reason the Aregbesola-led administration must pray towards turning the counsel of the Ahithophels to nought! Truth  be told:  Nigerians are hungry and their quality of life has become so unimpressive that, should the opportunity present itself again, one is not in doubt of President Muhammadu Buhari’s recalibrating  the illusion of ‘belonging to  nobody’ and “everybody”. Sad therefore that Osun is being treated as a case in isolation!

At a time like this, clarifying extant confusions troubling Nigeria’s Israel may tend to suffer from conceptual impressions. Petty quarrels among brothers also have the capacity to snowball into politically-motivated eruptions of cataclysmic proportions if not accorded the honour of fragility it deserves. To this end, necessary steps must be taken to urgently address all ideological disputations that may want to pitch APC members in the tents of Us versus Us. Most importantly, the salary dislocation which has so far proved to be no respecter of party, racial or gender affiliations must be  courageously confronted in a way that will  ultimately  leave  all parties convinced that the country’s present pass truly has an expiry date.

Let me by way of conclusion state that, on a good day, an election of this shape and size should afford members of the ruling party a rare opportunity of closing ranks for the purpose of retaining the state for the party in 2018. The hope is that events as they happened in Edo State on September 28, 2016 and Ondo State on November 26, 2016 would provide lessons sufficient enough for the ruling party to  deactivate opposition’s fantasy that it is the party of choice in Osun.

May the Strength of Israel grant our leaders the wisdom to lead us aright!