Dear PDP Chairman,

Now that you have released your Electoral Guideline and modalities for the nomination and expression of intent from your prospective Presidential candidates, I want to thank you for the depth of its details and its friendly gestures towards the female contestants.

Your guideline is coming at a time when Nigerians are clamoring to be spoilt for choice of presidential candidates and professed presidential agendas. President Buhari has done his best and he keeps trying, but Nigerians are yearning for an alternative, a competition, a paradigm shift from which they can make their deliberative choices at the polls.

Among the many modalities in your guideline is the requirement that prospective candidates be Nigerian by birth, each candidate is to attach a copy of his/her voters card and that each aspirant be nominated by not less than 60 persons from at least two-thirds of all the states of the federation among many others.

Sadly, your Electoral Guideline failed to require candidates to also attach their Sustainable Development Blue Print and Pathways. Their intentions for active and effective governance or more succinctly, details of their agenda for better governance for sustainable development, inclusive growth and shared prosperity.

Nigerians will be interested to see how familiar the prospective candidates are with Global Sustainability trends as

Sustainability as the Future of Business
Climate Change Mitigation, adaptation and control
The Future of Machines and industrial labour
China and the global shift to the East
Transparency and Global Best practices
The Shift towards Renewable Energy
Volatility of Super structures due to Disruptive Technologies

The emergence of an upwardly mobile and sustainability minded professionals in Nigeria further lends credence to this missing value in your Electoral modalities. Most Nigerians are beginning to contest for laurels on the global stage where sustainability is an important quotient. The shared prosperity derivative of sustainability is not lost on the over 91.6 million internet users in Nigeria who come in contact with global realities and trends per minute per seconds.

It is imperative that the tenets of sustainability be included in your Electoral Guidelines. Sadly, political actors in Nigeria have always understood Sustainable Development as a help-the-poor agenda and have relegated it to the back burner. You will sway a large chunk of private voters, organized private sector and the international community if your prospective candidates present their sustainable development blue print showing how they intend to achieve inclusive growth and shared prosperity for Nigerians.

It is my belief that political strongmen, king makers, political parties and popular opinion leaders be made to understand the concept and benefits of sustainable development and that prosperity can be shared for all, that it can be shared without being scarce for those who give, it even grows as it is shared.

Anih Ambrose

Country Manager Sustainability Watch Nigeria