Winning an election in Democratic setting, like in Nigeria, no matter how powerful and calculative you think you are, is not a tea party. There would be always factors at play, including deviousness and armtwisting among several others, to stand in the way of victory.
Difficult as winning election is, staying in power and performing to the satisfaction of the majority appears more harculean. This is also predicated on many factors, both within (the performances or lack of them by those that are selected to work with the victor – Ododo) and without (those in opposition and enemies of progress).
Everybody witnessed the many rivers which Ahmed Usman Ododo of the All Progressive Congress (APC) crossed, to win the November 11 Governorship election in Kogi State. The stumbling blocks are still being mounted by the opposition to undo the victory by all means.
Of course, one of the dark areas that would have made Ododo to lose the election was the issue around the payment of workers’ salaries, and pensioners dues, which the outgoing Governor, Alhaji Yahaya Bello would always swear he had not defaulted.
Ododo will do well by assemblying people, men and women who will help to address much of the human resource matters. This is because, despite the gargantuan achievements Yahaya Bello recorded in infrastructural development across the State, the seeming neglect of human factor tilted his government to uncomfortable bend. It is indeed, surprising that Governor Yahaya Bello came to know about the negative elements in his governance just at the tail end of his eight years in office.
Ododo, on his part, will do well by running an open government where citizens are informed about the direction of the government at regular intervals. Whatever it will cost, each commissioner and other relevant appointees, should be made to give account of his or her stewardship to the people, at least, every quarter.
As a matter of fact, emphasis should be given to the welfare and happiness of the workers, and if that is done, you can bet they will vounch for the government and stand by it in rain and shine.
Yes, governor Yahaya Bello has been able to tackle many issues around health, security, education and other sectors, Ododo will need to give emphasis to improvement on security, educational reforms, Internally Generated Revenue (IGR), road construction (doing some roads through Public Private Partnership and, if it is federal roads, claiming the money spent after) and agriculture and food security, ICT and creation of possible industrial estates.
The incoming Governor should device the methods of personally monitoring the performance of his appointees and a way of encouraging citizens’ participation in governance.
There are bound to be individuals who would feel a sense of entitlement hovering around the government, the governor should not ignore them but find ways of treating such individuals diplomatically.
In fact, once you run an open system, like the Governor of Borno State, Babagana Zulum has been doing, you will be able to manage the crowd of fortune seekers whose idea of government is the free distribution of resources, at the detriment of genuine development.
And, being an African and a thorough-bred Ebira man, Ododo should not ignore the factor of herbal preparation war (jazz), which governor Yahaya Bello referred to as “ahono eweyi-weyi” when he addressed his appointees recently. Ododo and the people around him need to pray very well to avoid being hooked by individuals or groups through such “jazz.”
May Almighty Allah guide you to success.
