Re: Neither Jonathan nor Buhari

The article titled as above, written by Henry C. Onyema and published in the Monday, 12 January, 2015 edition of BusinessDay, misses the point.

To summarize the writer’s opinion, as 2015 elections approach, neither PDP nor APC, but a third force, can rescue Nigeria from the current doldrums it finds itself.

I agree with the writer that, to the extent that we want an ideal system, neither APC nor PDP, as are currently constituted, can give us. But the issue is, 2015 is less than five weeks away, where will the third force come from?

I think this is the time to be realistic, not the time to sit on the fence. We have been on this road for almost sixteen years and the “alternative young ‘madmen and women’ who may do the needful”, as the writer suggested, has not surfaced. For how long are we going to wait? Can we continue like this in the name of waiting for this alternative?

There was a third-force alternative in Gani Fawehinmi, the world-acclaimed selfless social activist, in 2003. What was the result? How many people rallied round him?

You see, we cannot ignore structure in politics and structure is not something you build overnight. In a situation where more than 90 percent of the politicians are not clean, I wonder how anyone, no matter how clean the intention is, will say he can ride to presidency without using these “dirty” men and platforms.

With 2015 presidential elections just few weeks away, sitting on the fence, like Onyema’s article suggests, will do more harm than good. This is not the time to sit on the fence just because the two platforms and candidates are not the ideal options. After all, we have been hearing the cacophony of youth revolution for years, while things continue to get worse.

This is why, to me, advocating a third force at this point in time is not an option. The option is between the two candidates presented to us by these platforms. We are ready to go for whichever we consider the lesser evil.

Suraj Oyewale Ajah