You Either Participate In Politics Or Shut Up!
You think politics is dirty and politicians are crooks. You think participating in political process is beneath you because you survived and possibly excelled so far without getting involved in the dirty game.” Yet every day you sit down to complain…politicians are corrupt. Members of the. National Assembly are thieves…Members of the State Assemblies are puppets. My friend shut up!
Every day you complain of recession. It’s either Buhari is a failure or PDP ruined the economy before Buhari came. If you think Buhari is incompetent how many times have you spoken up? And if you say it’s PDP, where were you in the 16 whole years PDP ran its rampage? How many times did you rise against PDP with your votes or with your enlightenment? And now you rise against those who criticize Buhari even when he’s wrong and your only reason is because you like him. The issues at stake don’t MATTER! …But you will complain of recession!
AND you younger ones when it was BIG BROTHER AFRICA you followed it like a religion, you knew all the housemates by name, their individual characters and temperament…their history…You watched all through even at wee hours…You campaigned for housemates…. You spent your money buying data and voting…. Yet you possibly don’t know the name of the councilor representing you…You will not go out to vote even when casting your vote is free and you have a rare opportunity to determine who represents you…your own voice, in the fora where your fate and that of your children either born or unborn will be determined. Yet you run your mouth complaining about politics and politicians, based on logistics, can’t you see how stupid you are? Please shut the f–k up!
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Participation does not compulsorily mean contesting elections or becoming a card carrying member of any political party. Your vigilance, your demands for accountability by keeping government on its toes… Your presence during elections to vote, or act as monitor…taking time out to enlighten others on the programmes of parties or integrity and capacity of candidates…. mobilizing against cheating and bad governance. All these amounts to participation.
Whether you like it or not politics and politicians control your life and will forever continue to do so. The entire economy, education, infrastructure, health, agriculture, jobs etc. As a matter of fact, the law or your entire existence is controlled by people you think are either mentally inferior to you, are crooked or incompetent. Yet you won’t participate. You only want to sit somewhere to complain. Just shut up!
Do you even know that politicians and governments are more responsible and responsive if they have an enlightened, vigilant citizenry holding them to accountability through active participation? Why do you think the mind boggling corruption we complain of in our land cannot happen in other democracies? Because their politicians are identical twin brothers of angels. Or because their system will not allow it? The Most powerful president in the world just sacked the Director of FBI, equivalent of our DSS and EFCC combined and all hell is let loose in the US. Why? Their system. What is their system? It is the vigilant and participating citizens who will ever challenge and mobilize against wrongdoings in governments without anyone renting them to protest. The citizens who ask questions and stay focused on issues affecting their country.
Our system can only develop to protect our politics and our future only when we shake off our toga or inertia and siddon look and start participating. Politics is dirty because good people keep a safe distance. The people we say are dirty will have no choice but to dominate and set the only standards and agenda they know. Nature is hostile to vacuum.
