Hyginus Banko Okibe, Ph.D.
There is the saying that “the labour of our hero’s past shall not be in vain”. This public declaration and national-driven vision statement of action and commitment seem to elude proper diagnosis and comprehension.
Generally, the labour of our hero’s past means that the vision and efforts of our founding fathers shall not be in vain. It specifically demands that we should resist the connivance of political opportunists from derailing the vision.
The vision and goals embody the master plan of the nation and the philosophy of its people, their culture, and existence. It is a directory of the routes that the leadership of the nation shall travel in leading the people to their desired destination.
We are nurtured to believe that these cementing attributes shall remain sacrosanct. We are also enjoined to vigorously pursue the underlying ideals, preserve the corporate culture of integrity and truthfulness, and keep the inspiration of patriotism alive by electing people with a passion to do good and conscience to leave an enviable legacy of selfless service, egalitarian motivations, and love of a habitable society for humanity.
The 2023 elections have further punctuated this national ideology with an elastic decline in public interest among the people that aspire to win elections, occupy public office, and oversee governance. The contemporary dominant trends manifest selfish ambitions and baseless assumptions about the primary reason for politics and political power.
This national plague has cascaded to the subnational politics and election contest, including in the local or primordial community where the garb of unity and love abinitio dignified each ethnic or religious belief as a distinct element. Today, the quest for material titles has exposed the bases of desperation to win elections at all costs and rule the people by deceit.
While desperation has become a new norm in power contestation, recent elections have revealed how it manifests in varying degrees and impact on the environment in different ways. The impact is worse when people deliberately use fake news to sustain false hopes and thereby fertilize unrealistic expectations that keep the believers in perpetual bondage.
The promoters of fake news, who magnify the parables of election fraud and stolen mandate, are known to apply every possible means to give their supporters daydream pills. With fake news, they brainwash people and turn them into robots that are manipulated as they like. This is rife with people who loathe defeat in elections and spread fake news. They do not see the political mandate as a call to serve and the collective invitation to contribute to that service in any little way possible.
Anyone who pays occasional visits to social media will notice that the Labour Party in Enugu State has been politicizing its defeat in the governorship election. While it is evident that the party appears not satisfied with the outcome of the election, it has harnessed the window of redress to approach the Election Tribunal to lay its complaints, and looking forward to getting justice.
Observers and spectators seem to agree that the justice being sought after by the Labour Party is a mirage based on the nature of their petition against the PDP. Aware of this lapse and in breach of due process, the same Labour Party has constituted a parallel Election Tribunal in the public domain, thus instigating the uninterested ever-busy individuals to become judges to the falsehood they peddle around the State.
It is also observed that some of them either directly or indirectly, fondly engage in writing a priori taxing petitions, lengthy essays, and legal opinions on fabricated subjects that gulp much wasted intellectual energy. They usually end up digging failed holes in the rock and seeking to anchor their visible frustrations on the public psyche with no meaningful results.
For want of a fruitful vocation to occupy their minds and hearts, they suffer the inability to believe the ineluctable reality that they lost the gubernatorial election, which defies their vague imagination. They have often strayed from the world of reason to feed on unprofitable sentiment.
Sometimes, they erect to toil in vain, even when they know that it is the height of vanities that deplete human wisdom, render his thoughts worthless, and do not deserve attention. This is how bad the Labour Party pseudo mandate pursuit has degenerated, and how sad the situation has become in Enugu State.
Aside from the social media free space and the manifestation of despicable frustration that has become almost irredeemable, it is heartwarming to note that the Labour Party in Enugu State does not have tangible evidence in the case they filed against the PDP at the Election Tribunal. They will only engage the judges in verbose rhetoric and indistinct academic tourism.
The daily recitation of the concocted forged NYSC Certificate, and the empty noise about the already settled issue in Nkanu East are not cases that should busy the schedule of responsible people. Analysts have raised concerns that the lawyers in the Labour Party in Enugu state are working on defrauding the financiers of the legal process with the false assurance that they will eventually win the case, and enable them to recoup their investment when their candidate assumes office as governor.
Notwithstanding, the Labour Party has been making frantic efforts to debate, decide, exhaust, and perhaps conclude the purported cases they lodged in the Election Tribunal on social media. The essence is to complete the process before the conclusion of the hearing of the petition that has already begun and thereby seek a new ground to accuse the Election Tribunal Judges of compromising justice when PDP successfully defends the disabled allegations and wins.
The managers of the Labour Party petition are certain that they would be defeated and could only use social media to solicit public emotions and empathy, massage their wounds, and treat their defeat, which they hardly believe that it is real. But the loss is real, and the reality does not matter how bad they feel about the loss in the election
If the Labour Party could realize the enormity of the cases they are facing and the burden of the proof of several false allegations hanging on their shoulders, one of them will be intelligent, courageous, and humble enough to tell the shadow chasers among them to stop drifting, refrain from showcasing ignorance, and cease to exhibit nuisance character henceforth
This leaves one to wonder if the so-called lawyers among the Labour Party stolen mandate propagandists know the written and the spoken language of the law. Maybe, fake news and mischief have become an invented Nigerian factor that the Labour Party has its patency. If that is the case, there may not be any further need to inform them that the PDP leadership under His Excellency, Barr. Peter Mbah is committed to providing good governance and keeping his promises to the people of Enugu state and is not interested in frivolities.
It is only a proven collective case of inordinate ambition and desperation that would not allow a single person in the fold of the Labour Party to know that once a case is sub-judice, it leaves the public domain where emotions suppress facts and proper reasoning. Instead, the matter is shifted to the desk of legitimate institutions that are responsible for addressing issues being canvassed by all the parties concerned.
What it means is that the Labour Party should stop distracting public attention by dissipating energy in chasing vain things and allow the umpires to do justice in the pending cases. But the truth of the matter is that the protesters in the Labour Party have become convinced that the petition they lodged in the Election Tribunal is nullity.
The root of the problem lay in the political investors who committed huge capital to the Labour Party governorship project in Enugu State. They will not easily believe or accept that they have lost in political gambling without any return on their investment. The first step in the caution note they have to read with deep reflection is the 29th of May 2023 and the events following the swearing-in. The second is that while the case is ongoing, governance will also be ongoing. It tells a daft that there is no wisdom in chasing a rat while a building is on fire.
There is no doubt that the days of vain dreams and hallucinations are numbered before the moments of truth unveil the detractors and the hunters become the hunted by either the misinformed or duped creditors.
