This writer has no wish to trace the historical role of money in Nigerian politics. This is a grey area in Nigerian politics and it has really not been explored as a theme or a component of national politics. All we tend to hear from ordinary Nigerians are catch phrases such as godfathers; money bags and so on. Most of these expressions are thrown around openly with no real attempt to explain what they mean.
For the purpose of my paper, l will try to make some concrete references to individuals and how they have deployed their resources into politics and consequently affected and influenced political outcomes .Secondly, l will also make reference to the role of money in politics in other places so as to help us appreciate the general lubricating influence of money in politics and help us to situate our own conditions in proper context.
Although it has become common to say that money is the root of all evils, a closer examination of the daily usage of money can lead us to a slightly different conclusion, namely, that actually, it is the lack of money that is the root of all evils! Controversial as this may sound, in daily life, many noblemen have often turned to crime more out of necessity and to meet just ordinary needs than anything else. The quest for political office must be seen in the same context as the quest for other things in daily life; a house, a car, education, travel, comfort and so on.
Without money, none of these things is possible. Indeed, even what we sometimes ascribe to luck such as winning a lottery, all these are also operationalised by resources since you at least require a minimum amount of money to buy a lottery ticket. So, l think this point is important to human rights activists and should serve to help us move away from the mere thought that somehow, poor people can’t access power by wearing the toga of their poverty.
Money matters in politics because money matters in every aspect of our daily lives. If you wish to serve God, the mere wish is not enough even if you heard the voice of God. Someone must pay your fees and upkeep for the period of your training in seminary or Bible School.
Even though we often hear people say that money cannot buy love, that may be true, but to sustain and take this love to another level (marriage), you require money to continue to sustain the relationship whether it’s by emails, cards or travel to see the loved ones. So money has a role to play in politics because nothing is free in life. Although God made fresh air free or water free, the rich person has a better chance of breathing purified air through an air conditioner or better filtered water. So, when and how can money become a problem in politics? To answer this question, we need to turn our attention to the nature of the environment in which politics is played.
The environment of African politics has often lent itself to savage criticism, sarcasm and metaphor in the hands of African writers. This has been the preoccupation of some of our best minds: From Chinua Achebe’s Man of the People. Anthills on the Savannah. In all these situations, the authors have demonstrated how money has not only diminished political values but has also eliminated principles and nobility. We are left with the belief that once these characters took over the political space, they automatically drove out the serious men and women.
lndeed, today, this thesis has become very popular and has been used to explain why the military and politics became so short changed in Nigeria. But this is neither here nor there. One of the things that emerges from both the satirical presentation of politics and politicians is the fact that they all approximate real life. But they also expose what happens when mediocrity is allowed to triumph. Thus a poor political environment produces a poor political system whose outcome will naturally be poor. The two sets of scholars have tried to deal with this problem in Africa.
Francois Bayard published what he called, The Politics of The Belly in Africa. He was followed by two French scholars who also published a book: Africa Works. Africa Works proved very controversial to many African scholars. But l found the basis of the augment sufficiently persuasive. The book develops a thesis called, the Instrumentalisation of Failure.
Here, the author argues that the purposeful creation of an environment of scarcity by the African elites has its own efficacy because it enables those who handle the system to thrive in the adversity of their fellow human beings. When we test this theory here, we can find some resonance for it in our Nigerian situation.
Being paper delivered on June 21, 2023 at the Centre for Convention on Democratic Integrity lnc, Maryland, United States Virtual Round table Post General election Review /Conference.
***OLUFEMI ADUWO is the President, Centre for Convention of Democratic Integrity Inc.*
