The first time I heard this statement was when I was conversing with a friend of mine who we both attended the University. This person used to be the go-to person whenever there was any topic related to policies and the government of Nigeria. He was quite vested with political knowledge and had high hopes for Nigeria. When Buhari was contesting for his first tenure, he persuaded me to vote for Buhari, and he kept listing his achievement when he was head of state.
So when he said this statement just a day before the Presidential election in Nigeria, which took place on the 25th of February, it was said from a place of loss, hopelessness and pain. This used to be someone who forced me to go out and partake in my civil responsibility right by voting. Now, he does not even have a PVC, talkless of going to the Polling unit on election day to cast his vote. Nigeria has failed him, and he has concluded that all people in power are self-centred.
Who is to blame for arriving at this conclusion? Well, I agree with him to an extent. After acquiring a Master's degree, it was expected that tigs would get easier from that point forward, but he could not have been more wrong. Jobs were hard to get despite having the skills and qualifications he had been able to gather. Yet, no job was waiting for him, and when he was able to get a job, it was somewhere where he had been paid way much lower than someone with half of his qualifications would get.
Then it dawned more on me why he gave up. The government and political leaders of the country have failed him, and he had every right to be a little concerned about the result of the election. He did not even talk or check the manifesto of the candidate as he believed that they just wanted to win to assume power in other to be dorn with the title of MR President. He believed the politicians have nothing to offer, and I wished I had believed him sooner.
Not long before election day arrived, people were supposed to be outside voting at their different polling units. We have all come to exercise our rights as citizens in a democratic country. Little did I know that these so-called leaders were so hungry for power that they could employ any means just to assume office. This brought about the highest height of terrorism that I have ever seen as thugs were the star of the show, hijacking ballot boxes and destroying centres where people were voting.
In a country which prides itself on practising Domacracy. Which is the government of the people, for the people, and by the people; that was not the case on Saturday. It was so evident that this so-called leader wanted to rule us by force, and they disregarded the constitutional right of the common people. Even the independent commission conducting a free and fair election had a hand to play in ensuring this election was the worst ever performed. They assisted in ensuring that the election was rigged in favour of the greedy politicians for their own selfish gains. This goes a long way to show how deep the vices and wrongs in the country go.
In a country where the leaders have forgotten that their main duty in the office is to serve the people, they are so focused on just being in power with no intention or plan of taking the country forward. So when the second election was held, only a few people attended. The low turnout was because people now knew that their vote did not count as the greedy politicians who had help from other self-centred beings and thugs would find a way to void and make their votes useless.