Engagements By Chidi Amuta
Whoever fixed the next general elections for early January 2027 may not have considered Nigeria’s end of year cultural habits. When the year winds down, Nigerian generally enter an involuntary celebratory mood associated with Christmas and the anticipation of New Year. I suspect that even our Moslem compatriots begin winding down in spontaneous anticipation of the new year and new beginnings. Yet the coming of the 2027 elections in the midst of the end of year frenzy means that end- of- year excitements are mixed up with the fever of a campaign season.
Partisan Political campaigns have a life of their own. For politicians, campaign season is marketing season. It is time when different lies are burnished and paradise comes loaded in leaky baskets delivered by dubious marketers. As in every campaign season, partisans are traversing the nation in desperate campaigns to market and advance their party interests while non- partisan others are busy prepping for the end of year holiday and festive season.
In normal democracies, the ritual of seasonal campaign and elections is part of the festival of freedom. People feel free to expect the renewal of mandates of those who rule over them. Bad rulers, like old raggedy apparel, are cast away in a self -renewal that should make democracy fun.
But Tinubu’s Nigeria is different. This campaign season wears an untidy garb. It is more like a nationwide preparation for a vicious war. Political foot soldiers are more like private militias. They are armed by their principals with broken bottles, machetes, clubs, liquid poisons and stones. Their charge is simple: kill or maim the opponents. In most campaign events, there is violence and vengeful blood-letting all over the place. People who treasure their lives and liberty are frightened off campaign venues and events. In nearly every corner of the country, the reports are the same. Partisan thugs are unleashing violence and mayhem on their opponents. The paradox xtares you in the face. The same politicians who claimed a mandate to make life better for the masses four years ago are now offering the same people the instruments of death to kill or maim their opponents. That, for now, is the only “employment” available on offer for the masses!
In Cross River State on 4th November, 2026, thugs attacked the campaign convoy of NDC’s Peter Obi in Calabar. Campaign vehicles were damaged and persons injured. Obi and other opposition figures who managed to escape the mayhem issued statements to condemned the attack.
In similar vein, the campaign team of the Peoples Democratic Party was similarly attacked by armed thugs in the same Cross River State.
In Lagos, specifically Oregun, on Thursday, November 12th, 2026, thugs armed with machetes, broken bottles, clubs and stones invaded the Oregun venue of a townhall meeting of the National Democratic Coalition (NDC). The meeting It was organized to prepare the grounds for the planned campaign visit of the NDC presidential candidate, Mr. Peter Obi and his running mate, Rabiu Kwankwaso to Lagos. In the ensuing mayhem, all hell was let loose when the NDC members were attacked and later fought back their attackers. Attendees and journalists were injured and equipment damaged. The police responded by showing up over an hour later to quell the situation and make some arrests. Condemnations of the incident have since come from partisans across divide including the ruling All Progressive Congress (APC) who were fingered as the prime subjects for the attack.
In Edo State, on October 6th 2026, an attack at Igueben targeted ADC’s Kenneth Imansuangbon . Shots were fired. A youth reportedly lost his life and vehicles destroyed. Similarly, Edo state has witnessed the destruction of rival campaign material and displays. Blames and counter blames have continue to be traded between partisans.
In crisis-torn Benue State, the long -standing insecurity and violence has been aggravated by sporadic political violence. In September, the Labour Party campaign convoy of Peter Obi was blocked and attacked by thugs. Allegations that the state government may have been behind the attack was later disputed by the state government which remains embattled in inter communal blood-letting between migrant herdsmen and settlers on a regular basis.
Easily the most topical scene of the raging political violence is the series of incidents that have occurred in Sokoto. There have been serious breaches of the peace as a result of violence associated with the 2027 campaigns. The most significant one is the reported attack on the campaign convoy of the ADC governorship candidate in the state- on October 30th.Similarly, a women’s procession on October 28, leaving many injured. The threat of Sokoto veering to the opposition has now overtaken normal political activities in the state. A plan by the Atiku-led ADC to inaugurate its national campaign in the state was barricaded by a total lockdown of all possible venues in the state- stadia, halls, hotel banquet halls etc. But the determined ADC devotees and members had a better idea. Undeterred, they converged on Sokoto city only to converge at an open street for their event. Both the state government and the incumbent ruling party are yet to recover from the shock of opposition solidarity.
The situation in Gombe state is no different from what has obtained in the foregoing states. The political campaign convoy of Isa Pantami, the PDP governorship candidate has been repeatedly attacked by armed thugs and hoodlums. Assailants once blocked his campaign routes with burning tyres before security arrived to clear the route. This has been followed by vandalization of campaign offices and billboards of rivals throughout the state.
All this is happening at a point when the campaigns are yet to gather steam. And we are yet to get to the electoral heartlands and political hotspots of the nation. Places like Port Harcourt, Kano, Ibadan and FCT. Not to talk of the gun centres of the South East and South South. The possibility is rife that the atmosphere of warfare around the 2027 campaigns will further intensify as the stakes get higher. The fear is potent that from broken bottles, clubs and machetes, we could progress to the abduction and kidnapping of political opponents and even outright political assassinations of rivals. The challenge of law and order in this election season is that of saving politicians from themselves and saving the rest of the society from the excesses of politicians.
It used to be bad enough that our political contests were doomed to fraudulent abuse on the part of the umpire. It was also sad enough that most of our political disputes ended up being resolved by dubious courts presided over by corrupt and greedy judges. To arrive at the present situation where political campaigns are bedeviled by physical violence is to further degrade whatever was left of our democracy and send it nearer to anarchy and a Hobbesian state.
The reasons for this slide are many and varied. The hardship all over the land in the last four years has created an atmosphere of further desperation both among the populace and the political gladiators. Political thugs have existential issues to navigate. Political godfathers and employers have treacherous deadlines and targets in terms of financial obligations. Competition for scarce resources have become more fierce. Equally, the pressure to win elections at all costs have become more severe. Between the jackals of power and their dogs of war, no one knows what to choose.
There is also in all this a political reflection of the overall atmosphere of violence and insecurity in the nation. We now live in a place where those with the instruments of violence rule the lives of the rest. In our ensuing bandit takeover of the country, homes, highways and neighborhoods have seized to be safe. What should be the pursuit of happiness in an atmosphere has turned into survival of the fittest in a land where the possession of private instruments of violence has become the determinant of who is strong and who has the greater chances of survival in an increasingly treacherous and precarious world. A curious inverted and sinister now rules our lives.
Since the possession of political power and the occupation of public office also mark the access to financial prosperity, political contest cannot but be as vicious and dangerous as life in the wider society. It is a brutal contest to ascend positions of power because that is the surest way to attain a good life.
For as long as the present hardship persists, only the strongest can hope to attain the good life. Political contest may remain a game for the most vicious and fierce unless we reclaim the security of the state and the primary instruments of violence. Ultimate violence needs to quickly be restored to the state in order to de-commission freelance non -state operatives and casual killers.
But here lies the problem of this moment in the development of Nigerian democracy. To surrender the challenge of political succession to the forces of casual violence is to hand over the future of our republic to the rule of the state of nature where jungle justice defines existence. Yet the object of every democracy is the enthronement of an orderly society in which civility overwhelms violence and anarchy. In that orderly context, campaigns become festivals for canvassing rival formats of order. Political succession becomes a game devoid of violence aimed at enthroning the best choice of the people. No aspect of the democratic ritual should be made so dangerous and frightening that the people should be afraid to participate in it. Nor should we persist in the political culture that believes the people are being held to ransom by an armed political elite.
There is a conspicuous danger in the current political drama. Desperate populist demagogues like FCT Minister, Nyesom Wike, David Umahi, Godswill Akpabio and Aviation Minister Festus Keyamo have become the faces and voices of the present transition campaign. A transition rhetoric framed by opportunistic miscreants cannot possible lead to a free and fair election let alone advance the cause of a credible democracy.
A popular choice that enthrones either the same old order or is compelled to choose the triumph of the most violent alternative cannot be described as an exercise in democratic choice.