God save us from the Buhari-Obi voter

You may be wondering where I got the title from, well, it was inspired by American politics. When Donald J. Trump unexpectedly won the November 2016 presidential election in that country, many people who were taken unaware started traveling round the country to find out what made so many of their fellow country men and women fall for such a shallow con man and they found a bunch of voters who voted for Barack Obama 8 years earlier but switched parties and ideologies and voted for Trump. They were called the "Obama - Trump voters". Many of them sounded noble and like they genuinely loved their country but when you dig in to it and find out about the character of the two men they voted for, those voters begin to sound more like threats rather than patriots.

A similar wave is brewing in Nigeria with many people who campaigned and voted for President Muhammadu Buhari all of a sudden finding a different calling and now campaigning for the Anambra businessman, former governor Peter Obi.

These voters are largely divided into two broad categories and both will be dissected in the next paragraphs.

First, there's the batch of people just looking for the next shiny material. These people don't like being left out, they want to be a part of every social media trend and look cool in front of their mates. They know little to nothing about politics and policies and frankly don't care. Think about it, what similarities do Peter Obi and Muhammadu Buhari have in common besides being the head of the wing of promise. The "new kid" on the block and the darling of internet celebrities and influencers. Check their ideologies and policy proposals, they couldn't be farther apart but like Obama in '08 and Trump in '16, they come with the idea of dismantling the status quo and installing a new order. These set of supporters I address in this paragraph have no sound belief system, they just want to burn everything down. They are the type of people who will join a protest and mob justice or "jungle justice" before asking what the motive was. They just want to belong! They just want to be a part of something, especially if the "cool kids" are doing it. They are the peer pressure voters with no conviction whatsoever. If you don't get what I'm trying to say, they are dangerous!

The second set are the snake oil buyers. Those people who are actually genuinely concerned about the state of the country and want to make a change but they are too desperate for it and so are willing to try any and everything that present like a solution. You know, those people who listen to one carefully choreographed speech or manifesto that was prepared by political marketers and immediately fall for it. You know that one friend who is so desperate to get married and have been heart broken 16 times in the last 12 months? That guy! Their hearts are fast to believe anything and they quickly make up their minds to try. The problem is, the country is in too much of a chaos for "trial and error" and every decision from the office of the president carry, in many cases, repercussions that take a lifetime to fix. Take the American immigration crisis for example, Trump came in and promised an oversimplified solution - "build a wall" and they ran with it. He built no wall and made no significant improvements but like the snake oil peddler, he got tens of millions of Americans to buy! Remember when stealing and corruption was going to stop once the disciplined general ascended the highest office in the land? Well, not only did stealing not stop, animals joined in the party!

The thing about these people is they always vote and in 2027, they'll be ready to make the same mistake over again.

The solution is for everyone who know better must rise up and do better. 

Make adequate research about the candidates, don't be too timid to ask questions because the mob already made up their mind on who to vote and you dare not question them. Imagine if we had asked more questions in 2015 and probed further into the past records of dogo'n Daura, who knows? We could've gone the other route.

When they say "vote your conscience" and "vote wisely", you should and that starts from questioning everything and everyone!