Fashola's Elitism

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Still reeling from the shock of its staggering electoral reversals in Ekiti, Osun, Ondo and Edo states, PDP leaders in the south west have understandably seized upon the party's victory in the House of Assembly bye-election in Ikorodu to rekindle the hope and confidence of their members. If the party could record an election triumph in Lagos, the redoubtable bastion of progressive politics, they reason, surely there is still a ray of hope for the conservative, main stream ideologues in a region once famously described as the 'cock pit of Nigerian politics'.

On their part, many ACN members in Lagos may feel that the party ought to have deployed the phenomenal powers and resources of state power to ensure that the PDP's slim victory in the Ikorodu bye-election never happened. But that would negate the essence and spirit of progressive ideology. A key component of the progressive manifesto is a profound respect at all times for the will of the people as expressed in free and fair polls no matter how unsavoury the outcome.

Thus, in the 1954 federal elections in western Nigeria, for instance, the Action Group, which was the party in government, lost to the NCNC by 147,301 votes to the latter's 218,473 votes. Interestingly, the electoral commission that conducted the election was constituted by the AG government. Yet, the election was free and fair with the AG graciously conceding defeat. The party then went back to the drawing board, intensified implementation of its progressive policies and bounced back strongly in the next elections. That is the spirit of true progressivism.

Fashola's elitism