With all his exposure, social relations and seeming religious understanding and tolerance, former Lagos state governor and Presidential candidate of the ruling APC, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu disappointed not a few Nigerians with his avowed insistence of a muslim-muslim presidential ticket. This is coming against constructive advice from eminent Nigerian leaders of different backgrounds against choosing a fellow muslim instead of pairing with a Christian for balance governance. Let it be known that those seeking for a balanced Presidential ticket are not doing so for fear of islamisation of the country.
No no, very far from it. It is to balance a natural instinct of having a sense of belonging, pride, security, etc, which allows every segment of the population to participate in the decision making process of a nation as encouraged by democracy. If its for the fear of turning the nation into one religion, then Tinubu himself, a muslim, could have converted his Christian wife. Democracy is a growing natural component of man’s growth and development which begets respect, fairness, equity, equality, tolerance, etc and the absence of it in an association of people of different backgrounds communicates nothing but domination, intolerance, inequality, unfairness, disrespect and disdain, etc.
All associations of human beings survive on democracy where everyone feels a sense of belonging and security, pride, satisfaction. Because everyone is a political animal and the essence of politics is participation, where participation is deliberately exclusive, acrimony, conflict, suspicion, fear (both imagine and real), comes to fore. If only Tinubu and co will keep politics aside and reflect on the morality and godliness of the decision, am sure he will understand better. But because of extreme politicisation, he sees nothing wrong in it. In his years as governor of Lagos and as the kingmaker in Lagos for years, I stand corrected: his state, where both populations are of equal status, there has never been a Muslim-muslim or Christian-christian ticket. Many have been wondering whether the action is purely to compensate loyalty or to advance a business interest or for other reasons yet unknown. The exclusive political or economic interests of such a same faith ticket has not been enumerated to the nation because there is none, not a single one. Majority of states where we have same faith tickets are areas where one faith clearly dominates the other in clear proportion..
The level of national uproar and international condemnation was enough to change the heart of Tinubu . The danger of this is that every action of government and its organs can easily be interpreted, presented and even mispresented in religious terms whether intended or not. Someone has, among many questions, asked a simple question as to the use of the asorock villa church if the VP is a muslim. This may look so simple and ignorable, but the reality is starring at us. And if for any reason it happened, another faulty line has been opened in the warped political permutations of the nation, where its sustenance even at the risk of many negative consequences will be continuously advanced. In the immediate past there has been serious concerns over the dominance of presidential appointments especially of security chiefs by one faith over the other.
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