Many people have asked Festus Keyamo, “You seem like a nice young man. You’ve done all this great work. You’ve been a successful lawyer, and you are critics, you’re a civil rights attorney, you always fight against corruption, you are a family man, why would you want to go into something dirty and nasty like politics?” And he understands the questions, and the cynicisms. We all understand it.
We understand it because we get the sense today that politics has become a business and not a mission. In the last several years, we have seen Abuja become a place where keeping score of who is up and who is down is more important than who’s working on behalf of the Nigerian people.
We have been told that our mounting debts don’t matter, that the economy is doing great, and so Deltans should be left to face their anxiety about rising health care costs, rising cost of education, increase in standard of living and disappearing pensions on their own.
We relied so much on oil, that other sectors are not given attention, Agriculture is not encourage in commercial scale, there are no industries and factories to employed our jobless youth.
And when we try to have an honest debate about the crises we face, whether it’s on the facebok, twitter or tv stations, town hall meeting or a talk show, the conversation isn’t about finding common ground, it’s about finding someone to blame. We’re divided into zones and Ethnicity, and told to always point the finger at somebody else – the other party, or oppositions, or the people.
Corruption is a common thing in every society, but I think it's fair to say that the scandals that we've seen, both legal and illegal, under the current political dispensation, are far worse than most of us could have imagined. Think about it. In the past several months, we've seen politicians living in affluent, we’ve seen our law makers going abroad in the name of legislative business, we’ve seen our law makers been arrested for taking millions of dollars in bribes. It is painfully obvious that corruption stifles development - it siphons off scarce resources that could improve infrastructure, bolster education systems, and strengthen public health. It stacks the deck so high against entrepreneurs that they cannot get their job-creating ideas off the ground. Corruption also erodes the state from the inside out, sickening the justice system until there is no justice to be found, poisoning the police forces until their presence becomes a source of insecurity rather than comfort.
Corruption has a way of magnifying the very worst twists of fate. It makes it impossible to respond effectively to crises -- whether it's the HIV/AIDS pandemic or malaria or crippling drought.
What's worse - corruption can also provide opportunities for those who would harness the fear and hatred of others to their agenda and ambitions.
It can shield a criminal - even one like Bode Goerge, Odili, Alams, Andoakha, Bankole, Lawan, even those that were involved in oil thief suspected of helping to finance and orchestrate the present dispensation - by allowing them to purchase safe haven for a time and robbing all humanity of the opportunity to bring the criminal to justice.
So I have just one question for you the people of Delta senatorial central, Are you fired up? Ready to go? You have a duty to convince that neighbor of yours who is cynical about whether there can ever be a change, weather we can ever have the government of the people and for the people in delta state. It is your duty to tell them that Festus Keyamo believes in a government that works for the people and not against the people. FESTUS KEYAMO is out to redefine politics. NA OUR HAND E DEY!