The long awaited 2015 electioneering campaign is here, political actors and gladiators are having their hands full with beehive of activities which are all targeted at one goal “winning and gaining the support of the electorate”. Is that not all what political campaigns is all about? Politicians all over the world have been very innovative in devising means of wooing the electorate into voting for them, and in the cause of getting there support, they use persuasive words wrapped up in a lot of promises as a reward for voting them into power. One point worthy of note here is that there is no legal means of checkmating and enforcing them into fulfilling these promises when they eventually come into power, and this is the major challenge with “political campaign promises”.

The two leading presidential candidates are not newcomers in the game of making verbal promises to the masses. I will like to recall one sterling verbal outburst made by them leading into 2011 presidential election.


On the 31st of January 2011, Presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Goodluck Ebele Jonathan while addressing diplomats at the United Nations Economic Commission For African, UNECA, and the African Union AU, in Addis-Ababa, said he has no ambition to stay in office beyond 2015, he made this promise at that occasion along with lots more bordering on security, education agriculture, and transport.
Weather the president has fulfilled all those promises or not is not in my place to pass such judgments, but my point is that no matter how, who and when the promise was made, there is never going to be a 100% fulfilment anywhere in the world.
In a similar fashion, another leading presidential candidate of the All Progressive Congress, APC said on the 13th of April 2011 while speaking at the grand finale of his presidential campaign in Abuja said “I will not seek any elective office after Saturday’s election” the statement was made three days before the 2011 presidential elections, along with a host of other promises.


But that was four years ago, things change you know, and here we are, another election in hand barely less than six weeks away. One cannot dispute the fact that humans are not perfect like God, we all make mistakes at one point in our attempt to get favors from people, the same can equally be applied to the above scenarios.
The electorates are conglomeration of different people, with different background, cultures, religion and values, a uniform approach will fail in convincing these various species into voting for one candidate or the other. So understandably, politicians have a lot of work to do in using different tactics and methods in wooing them into gaining there acceptance and support. That has been one of the reasons why politician make a lot of promises leading into an election.


The Implication
The whole euphoria of electioneering campaign promises is not something the people should base their decisions on, as we can see from the above analysis that non of the leading candidates has the guts to keep to their words in the previous elections. The choice of candidate should not be based on what a politician said, but on one’s personal conviction with regards to conscience.

Failed campaign promises by implication will give rise to political apathy, people will lose confidence in the entire process, and this may result to elections not representing the true will of the people. Even in advanced nations like the US, Russia, United Kingdom, France and China, electoral promises have never been trusted by the electorate.
Some of the ill-will, disaffection, hatred, criticism and violence in our society can be traced back to politicians’ inability to redeem their pledges, the people uses various methods to express their grievances towards the ruling class, and the entire nation at large. This have thrown this Nation into a war zone over the past couple of years and if this practice is not checked, it can result to greater catastrophe.
Politicians need to consider all these facts before altering any promises, putting into cognizance the aftermath of such utterances in the event that they are not able to fulfil it. It will be worthy of note that there is no saint among politicians, when you look at them from a distant, there is one thing they have in common, that is in my own words ‘never trust the promise made by a politician’.

The future
When we consider all these issues, one question that is begging for answer is what does this practice have in stock for the future? Your guess is as good as mine, considering the fact that the words of a politician has no divine direction, it will be quite clear to us that they are simply super mortals preying on the power of persuasion.
For years past till date, Nigeria remains the way it is because the people that has the power to make the change have always relinquished their power to the strong appeal from men who’s taste for power have blinded them into make promises that can never be redeemed. Here is another opportunity, the masses once again have the power, the power to retain or elect a new government.

The future cannot be great without pressing the real issues. The real issues now bothers on security, education, power, economy, and the way forward on the fight against corruption. It is unfortunate the current politicians have replaced these issues with propaganda and politics of bitterness and anger and it appears the masses are cheering them on who gives the hardest knock against each one another.
It is time to rise up people! The power lies on our tomb, let’s use it to make the much needed decision now.

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