On September 28 this year, presidential candidates of the various political parties will hopefully flag- off their campaigns. At least, that is the day that INEC has set for campaigns to start, for presidential and National Assembly elections.
Already, INEC has released the final names of presidential and National Assembly candidates. According to the commission, 18 political parties are sponsoring presidential candidates and their running mates, while for legislative elections, 1,101 candidates are vying for 109 senatorial seats and 3,122 candidates for House of Representatives seats.
Of this number, 3,875 of the candidates are male, made up of 35 for presidential and vice presidential, 1,008 for senate and 2,832 for House of Representatives, while 381 females comprising one for presidential, 92 for senate and 288 for House of Representatives are also contesting the elections. Also, 11 Persons with Disability are in the race.
These are the people that will be campaigning, using whatever method they deem fit, to win the heart of the electorate as the nation gets ready for the 2023 general election. As has always been the case, there will be movement of persons from one state to the other, from one local government to the other, from one ward to the other and from one voting unit to the other.
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Some are also likely to move from house to house.
There will be campaigns in the media. The social and conventional media would be used maximally by politicians to sell themselves and their programmes. They will attempt to undo each other.
While we welcome every effort at campaigning- afterall any politician that fails to will not be regarded as a serious contender-we believe that there must be decorum. There must be sportsmanship throughout the campaign period. A situation where politicians would make moves to prevent their opponents from entering their own states or villages or wards or towns to campaign should not be heard of. Things like this have been common place in the past and should be avoided at this time of our political life.
At other times, politicians have had to use tools of blackmail, outright calumny, character assassination and other injurious campaign mechanism against their opponents. This is not what and how it should be.
We urge politicians to refrain from anything that will be injurious to each other. TNN advocates and stands for campaigns based on issues. It smacks of cowardice to attack a political opponent who may be trying to campaign in certain places considered to be the stronghold of certain opposition political parties.
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We urge all politicians to do things in new ways, instead of the old fashion of killing those considered political enemies, in the course of campaigns.
We also urge security agencies to be on the alert and be willing and ready to deal decisively with anyone caught, while trying to go against the rules of engagement. This is a new political dispensation and things should be done differently so that Nigeria can experience some level of fresh air in its political re-engineering processes. Let’s look forward to issue based, peaceful campaigns.
