BY FEMI OGUNLEYE
I am a Nigerian senior citizen. I am a journalist having engaged in newspaper reporting for about four decades in Nigeria and across the borders. I am a Fellow of the Nigerian Institute of Public Relations and have practiced public relations in public service and private consultancy for a quarter of a century before veering into traditional institutions as a recognised Oba (Traditional Ruler) in Ogun State, Nigeria.
In the twilight of life, I have made incursion into law study, reading from the basics to a doctoral degree level and today as a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Mediators and Conciliators, engaged in series of mediation to amicably settle disputes of various categories, thus helping to sustain peace, tranquility and good relationships in our society.
This modest introduction is to provide background for my opinion on the current political campaigns by political gladiators for votes in the coming general elections in Nigeria. As it is well known, Presidential and National Assembly elections are to be held across Nigeria on February 25 while gubernatorial and state legislative elections follow on March 11, 2023.
Eighteen of the incumbent governors in the 36 states of Nigeria would not be eligible for re-election as they would have served their two-term limit as directed by the Constitution. The Ogun State Governor, Prince Dapo Abiodun is among the current governors seeking re-election as he is just completing his first term.
In the last two months or so that the campaign for the elections has started on all fronts, I have not seen any extraordinary evidence of dynamism and creativity that can change the pictures of the notable characters in the game as fixed in the heads of the electorates through proactive strategic public relations.
There is no evidence of specialization in the marketing formula for the candidates, portraying the electorates as dogmatic without inherent capability or capacity to obtain hidden truth. A planned strategic PR programme for politicians is often designed to ward off scenarios such as profile mutilation, discoveries and their misinterpretations, and above all, the use of comparative advantage in assessing candidates to inform and educate electorates is lacking.
Besides the preponderance of flattery and deceit surreptitiously impacted to the gladiators, perhaps for considerations, the values of public relations in political marketing are, stricto sensu , eroded, to the extent that the political campaign space is inundated with delusional soothsayer, in place of deliberate and calculated evidential activities within and outside the command of authority, that can sustain the credibility and human nature of the personalities seeking election.
As a traditional ruler, I am obligated to join every government of my state to proffer solutions to socio-economic development of our jurisdiction, taking the aspirations of my subjects into consideration, and that has been part of my responsibilities in the last 17 years on the throne.
Without a discounted loyalty to any state authority, irrespective of the personality in power at any given time, I hold tenaciously to the principle of fundamental human rights enshrined in the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, particularly section 40 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) which says: “Every person shall be entitled to assemble freely and associate with other persons, and in particular, he may form or belong to any political party, trade union or any other association for the protection of his interests”.
In obedience to the principle which makes a traditional ruler apolitical, I wear the togs of a “father” to all political gladiators granting them equitable privilege of voluntary entry and exit to my palace to market their propositions for governance ahead of election. My responsibilities to them include prayers and blessing from the throne and advice that when they achieve their goals, they should not forget to be accountable to their electorates.
Against the backdrop of the Law as espoused by section 52 (2)(a) of Obas and Chiefs Law of Ogun State, 2021 which says: “An Oba or a Chief may be suspended or removed, under this section of the Law, where he is found at or he attends a political rally or campaign ground of any politician” and in view of the fact that there is no lacuna of any form in the law under reference, any traditional ruler or chief who attends political rally of any politician, puts himself on the rope. This law is more in the breach than obedience. Both the law givers and those for whom it is made, enjoy the charade.
However, sub section (2)(b) of same section 5 of the law has relieved traditional rulers and their chiefs of any breach of the law if a politician or political party representatives visit them at their palaces.
“Where an oba or a Chief receives a politician or a political party in his domain or Palace, this shall not amount to participation in a political rally or campaign ground of politician or a political party under sub-section (2)a) of this section”, says the law. The safety valve for traditional rulers in this game is to be circumspect and avoid being on the chess board of politicians.
Political parties’ campaign teams in Abeokuta, obviously, have taken many things for granted by not deploying attention to a series of public opinion research mechanisms on and for their candidates within the constituencies of their domicile, the results of which would have assisted them to formulate their communication to the electorates.
Operatives of the ruling party, with all apparatus for creative attention, simply relied on conventional “roller-coaster” methods with reliance on “influencers” within and outside the traditional institution, some of whose flag bearers, in some identified space, swim in murky and odious water. This method, by any means, had not transmitted imaginative and convincing communication to the electorates beyond the clowning cliché of “4 + 4 = 8” regularly rehearsed by the concerned.
I give kudos to the Ogun State governor, Prince Dapo Abiodun for his spontaneous visit to the Abeokuta branch of the Central Bank of Nigeria in a proactive attempt to douse the self-inflicted tension created by the Federal Government over its, otherwise, good intentioned but mismanaged national financial policy.
But the sweetness of Governor Abiodun’s intervention was lampooned for lack of PR follow up. If at the end of the governor’s meeting with the Central Bank officials, he had been made to drive straight to the government radio house for an instant broadcast, calling for calm and he disclosed the synergy between his government and Central Bank to contain the situation, the mayhem of Tuesday morning would have been averted – power of creative thinking and strategic public relations.
Be that as it may, I, as a participant in some developmental socio-economic programmes endorsed by Governor Dapo Abiodun and from casual objective observation, I can give it to him. He has performed creditably well in many sectors of the state’s administration that, ceteris paribus, he deserves a re-election. Continuity in governance is a sine qua non policy towards inheritable development sustainability and Ogun State deserves such a trajectory.
.Oba Olufemi Adewunmi Ogunleye, LL.M , BL, FICMC, FNIPR, Chartered Mediator and Certified Global Peace Ambassador, is the Towulade Akinale, Owu Kingdom.
