If PDP Must Win Again

The developing truth is that the election management manual of the Peoples Democratic Party of (South-West) Nigeria is broken, and, however, must be entirely reproduced with a reviewed philosophy, attitude and grit!

As time goes on, we’ve deliberated more on why it seems the party cannot again, earn the trust of the electorate, notwithstanding the embarrassingly poor performance of the ruling All Progressives Congress.

Observing from the 2019 elections, to the stand-alone elections, there have been pointers to the fact that the PDP cannot come out victorious on Election Day what excessive gyrations on social media ignorantly make them believe.

More so, we’ve tried to study a more in-depth profile at the issues. We for surety, do not agree to the idea that the election umpire is the problem. The rules are the same for all parties; this is without prejudice to my firm opinion that we must continually improve the election process in such a way that it gets easier, cheaper and less dramatic, logistics-wise.

Nevertheless, beyond the childish saying of “we were rigged”, the truth is “we no longer know how to win” should be a more better eureka to admit to ourselves.

Additionally, the following areas may require more than a passing attention, but the list is by no means exhaustive:

Party Register:

Who are the registered members of PDP? To answer this question, we need to look at the quality and integrity of the membership register. As at the time of this writ, what we have is an embarrassing joke; a proper biometric sensitive register is now overdue. It will aid them to know their members and the planning can start from there as a first step.

The Message:

What exactly is their message to the people, and what is the believability quotient of what they are talking?

Campaign Management Structure:

We’ve agonised much on the silliness of our turn-up on rally days where party members or party itself say nothing meaningful at significant cost and call that a campaign. It is also useless that they need to snap out of this nonsense. They spend quality resources on prime time television at a colossal cost to say absolute unmeaningful, screaming PDP, power to the people, Buhari this, Buhari that, Bola Tinubu this. Nigerians must be told in clear terms, and we are saying this openly, that the approach is kindergarten in nature.

The Research:

There is no need overemphasising the fact that elections are residual decision-making events, and without adequate research, it becomes more like a medical doctor not doing a proper diagnosis before beginning treatment. Nothing can be more dangerous than that to a patient, and in this case, nothing absolutely can be more self-deceiving.

Short-term Loyalty Purchase:

The patent of this phrase belongs to our friend; Toks Modupe of Tpt. Money that goes into the day of the vote activities. How do we examine what is decent and how do we make sure we don’t scamper about on this score? Obviously, while we should be at the forefront of a massive campaign advocacy against vote-selling and vote-buying, we must also adequately prepare logistics and find out possible means to deploy and who to deploy to.

In addition, this business of so-called party leaders stealing campaign money is not only unfortunate, however, more disgraceful. If we had a proper party register, we could, through electronic transfer, give whatever to party loyalists to help with their logistics.

Party Agents:

Can we freely say that political parties, in this case the PDP train their agents well enough to know why they’re there on the field and what their duties and responsibilities calls for? Displeasing to know that they joke about it too much, if their idea of election management is to hurriedly put together a list a few days to the polls, throw our hands in the air pretending to train their so-called agents. How brilliant does that even sound to them, electoral policy and Nigerians at large? Well, it is the way of a dullard not to prepare on time for an examination.

Candidacy:

For surety, what do PDP [and other political parties] ought to look out for in picking candidates to fly their flags? Shall the electorate not compare and make informed choices?

NWC:

Those who manage PDP party at the national level need to ask themselves one question: “what we’ve been up and doing relative to the responsibility of an opposition party in an environment like ours?”

Our NWC has been reduced to a gang of tax-collectors who cause more harm than good, problems in the all sides. You only need to look through our state chapters, and you will agree to it that they have overstayed their shelf life and go they must.

More so, how do one explain the enunciations, monotonous, uninspiring press releases we call opposition work? Or is it the fiefdom of those who have been in NWC since 2003 that does not offend? Certainly, they have overstayed for any good they can offer. We need ideas, fresh ideas.

In-Party Fightings:

Granted, all human engagements are prone to challenges. One must say strongly and clearly that PDPs is a bit too much, and most times, you see PDP-made individuals throwing tantrums like juvenile delinquents that you sometimes wonder what sane people fight over. Oyo, the only place they’ve managed to conquer through joint venture and collaboration of other parties, is not spared; need we say Ekiti, where an infantile ex-governor plays the spoiler because of his excessively garrulous ways. Is it Ogun where protracted crisis still persists till today with nothing more than six groups notwithstanding the death of Kashamu? Everywhere you look, you see the tax collecting tendencies that Wike talks about at play.

Leadership Culture:

PDP has built a fairly well accepted principle and culture where a sitting President of our party is leader of the party nationally and a sitting Governor of our party is leader at the state ditto A local government Chiarman of our party being the leader in the local government. This tradition has served us well and has also been copied by their rival the APC, it is strange that while they have just one Governor in the southwest in person of Governor Seyi Makinde who in our opinion is well received across the country akin to a sort of brand champion for the PDP party they have now found themselves in an awkward situation where the leadership of the party at the National are allowing elements within the party to injure their collective brand under some contrived leadership struggle that their over 20years tradition has settled.

In Summary:

It would be likely impossible for PDP to defeat the APC in an election until they fix their house. It is tiresome for those of them that have never left the PDP party since its founding, but surely, we, like so many others, will not feed a dead child.

At the time of this writ, the child is ill, we and Nigerians at large will fast and pray, but once we don’t reform, surely, it will be appropriate to move on. The PDP has not been rejected by the people, not at all. They have simply refused to improve on all fronts. A stitch in time saves Nine, the wise English saying goes.