Asiwaju Tinubu Wonders At Politicians Who Turn Nigeria Into A Game

The national leader of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) has pondered over the way many politicians turned Nigeria into a game.
He said: “for too many, Nigeria itself is a game. They are not wedded to the idea and ideals of Nigeria as a diverse and democratic but unified nation.
“Too many of us for too long have treated politics as a game open only to an elite, exclusive club of players. The nation and the people constituted the pitch upon which the game would be decided.
“They see the nation not as object of loyalty but as the most available platform to realize their personal aims. In their minds, Nigeria is lesser than their ever expanding ambitions. Because they view Nigeria as a game, their politics is but a game within a game.”
Asiwaju Tinubu made these points as a guest speaker at the Daily Trust annual dialogue in Abuja on Thursday.
Tinubu, who was former governor of Lagos, noted the incorrect mindset that politics is a game has mis-shaped” the politics and injured the nation in ways mundane and profound.
Approaching nearly 60 years of independence, Nigeria remains a complex yet incomplete work of art, a project as much on the drawing board as it is our daily reality.
He said that instead of Nigeria to be a joyous nation, “we have become a cruel playground where the fears and concerns of the average person get exploited but their interests never get promoted.”
According to him, while democratic politics inherently bear aspects of competition and contest, he argued that such must never be reduced to a mere game.
“The objective of a game is served by the mere playing of it. Playing the game is an end in and of itself. However, this cannot be the case with politics and elections.”
Asiwaju Tinubu stressed that winning the political contest can never be an end in itself, adding that the proper outcome of electoral victory is not for the victor to revel at his good fortune or his skill in electioneering.
“The inevitable sequel to an election is for the winner to assume the sobering burden of governance. Elections are not the climax of an epic book. They are merely the close of the book’s opening chapter.
“What comes afterwards – governance — is much more vital than politics, for governance determines how we shall live.”[myad]