APC - ANOTHER POLITICAL CONUNDRUM?

Since the last week's successful registration of the All Progressives Party (APC) by the INEC, I have been casting a wary, and a weary, eye on the political landscape that this development has engendered. Suffice to say that it is widely acknowledged that the newly-registered APC will, undoubtedly, be quite a formidable opposition to the well-entrenched PDP. I will not waste the reader's time nor mine by chronicling the events leading to the emergence of APC, but invite the reader to ask a couple of pertinent questions: apart from warmly welcoming the emergence of a formidable new political entity, should Nigerians have high hopes of a positive change in the political ambiance? Will the APC turn out to be the Hobson's choice for Nigerians, while the PDP becomes the bete noir to Nigerians? Of course, the answers to these questions will depend either on one's political persuasion, or, to the apolitical, their personal experiences since 1999. It is from the viewpoint of the latter that I will answer both questions, since I'm not a card-carrying member of any political setup because none to date has any discernible ideology I can sympathize with. It will not take the reader long to realize that I have a strong distaste and ferocious dislike for the PDP, but this should not be misconstrued as a slant toward any other political party, be it new or old.

The history of this blog is awash with acerbic criticisms of the self-styled 'largest political party' in Africa. The PDP, so full to the brim with improvident gauche cormorants, has stopped the clock of Nigeria's development into a country fit for purpose. Label me monomaniacal (I actually make no apologies for being that), corruption has been promoted to legal status in our society. You're punished if you're not corrupt and you're rewarded for being. Don't the facts support the statement? Peccadillos are most severely punished while intemperate wolfing down of the nation's resources is met with an approving wink and a pat on the back. Malversations are par for the course. What's happened to the fuel subsidy thieves? Didn't convicted political and economic criminals get pardoned? Does anyone know how many petty criminals are in prison for years without trial? Check the facts. The PDP's destruction of our social fabric, the erosion of hope, and their venal predisposition, are decidedly unvenial. The country is heavily populated with starvelings and mendicants, with no hope of medicants. Yet, the milksop that is Jonathan claims to be presiding over a growing and sustainable economy. The sybarites and mountebanks surrounding him continually feed him with the garbage he wishes to hear, and cosset him to the point stupor.

Nigerians were hoodwinked by Jonathan's 'shoe-less' history. Little did we know that he was a shoe-less lightweight with an abulic trait, whose uxoriousness  was adroitly hidden from the public, and would turn out to be a damp squib. A duncish knave embarking on a bootless pursuit.

Now then, what has the neoteric APC got in its locker? Is its locker full of tricks or treats? Is it going to be another imprecation, or the much-awaited relief, to the long-suffering masses? Suggestions abound that it is comprised of heterogeneous interests, but how that is a defect is beyond me. For the APC to have a mass appeal, it has some serious stuff to accomplish, the least of which is not the programme of positive change it has for Nigeria, present and future. It has ample time to communicate such to Nigerians, both at home and in the diaspora. It is not just good enough to aspire to wrench power from the PDP, but Nigerians are curious to know how it proposes to stop the slide into the ineluctable anarchy that most certainly awaits if there is no change of course or a deracination of the debilitating culture of greed, avarice, and criminal abulia. Will the APC be truly and openly democratic, both within and without? Its appeal, and thus, its electability, will be a function of the strength and depth of its internal democratic principles. The dictatorial tendencies of its constituent parties will have to be jettisoned.

What does the APC have in stock for the impecunious majority of Nigerians? How is it going to improve our nation's battered and brutalized image abroad? The tens of millions of the long-term unemployed are waiting eagerly to see if it is the real deal. Will it be another false dawn? You see, there's plenty to be done, and much to be gained or lost. The nation is waiting; the wider world is watching whether the giant will finally wake up from its slumber. If Nigerians find it credible and think that it can steer the ship of state away from the rocks of perdition with sedulous zeal, the APC will not have much difficulty in forcing the egress of the monstrous disaster that the PDP has been, and the internecine feud among them could yet play well into the hands of the APC. The APC cannot afford to be an acronym for ANOTHER POLITICAL CONUNDRUM.