Beyond The Ballot: A 2027 Bucket List For The Governor Nigeria Deserves

One of the major contributors to the erosion of Nigeria’s democracy since 1999 has been the excessive concentration and frequent abuse of executive power at the state level.

In too many states, governors have ceased to behave as temporary custodians of the people’s sovereignty. They have become commanders of political parties, controllers of state legislatures, and thieves of money meant for the Local Governments. Where institutions should restrain power, personalities overwhelm institutions. Where the law should govern, political convenience prevails.

When a person without character, competence or moral restraint becomes governor, the consequences extend far beyond one individual. Personal dishonesty becomes official deception. Private greed becomes organised corruption. Intellectual weakness becomes defective public policy. The character of the governor gradually becomes the character of the government.

As Nigeria approaches the 2027 electoral season, citizens must confront a fundamental question: what manner of men and women should be entrusted with the government of our states?

This is my bucket list—not merely a list of wishes, but a standard by which governorship candidates should be examined. Nigeria does not need governors who are only capable of winning elections. It needs governors capable of governing truthfully, thinking clearly, acting justly and submitting power to the discipline of law.

1. Do Not Elect a Habitual Liar
My first wish is that Nigerians will refuse to elect habitual liars as governors.

A lie is not simply an inaccurate statement. It is an act intended to deceive and place the deceived at a disadvantage while the deceiver knows that what he has presented is false.

The habitual liar enters politics as a confidence trickster. During campaigns, he promises roads, schools, hospitals, jobs, security and justice. He tells every community what it wants to hear. Once elected, however, he becomes a predator of the same democratic system he promised to strengthen.

Governance declines while propaganda increases. Public money is spent manufacturing applause, concealing failure and attacking those who insist on the truth. Having exhausted deception, the dishonest governor may eventually resort to coercion, political thuggery and violence as his final defence against citizens determined to remove him.

Habitual lying is rarely acquired accidentally during an election campaign. It is usually part of a longer pattern of character. Before voting for a candidate, therefore, examine the person’s pedigree. What promises has this candidate made in the past? Which obligations has he honoured? Are her educational, professional and financial claims truthful and verifiable? How has the person treated associates, employees and institutions?

A candidate whose public life has been constructed upon falsehood cannot suddenly become the guardian of public truth simply because he has won an election.

2. Do Not Entrust the Treasury to a Corrupt Candidate
Closely allied to lying is stealing. The dishonest tongue and the corrupt hand frequently belong to the same person.

Voters must examine whether a candidate’s adult life reveals a persistent pattern of fraud, abuse of trust, financial impropriety, dishonest enrichment or misuse of responsibility, and falsification of educational credentials. A person who has repeatedly betrayed private trust should not be expected to become honest after gaining control of a state treasury.

Petty corruption, when left unchecked and empowered by public office, can develop into organised and far more destructive forms of corruption. The petty thief of yesterday may become the commander of grand corruption tomorrow.

Corruption is not merely the stealing of public money. It is the theft of opportunity from children, medicine from the sick, security from vulnerable communities and dignity from workers and pensioners. Every abandoned school, unequipped hospital and impassable road may represent money diverted from the public good.

A world-class governor must be prepared to disclose assets, business interests and potential conflicts of interest. Public procurement must be transparent. Budgets, contracts and expenditure must be open to scrutiny. A candidate who cannot credibly explain the origins of his wealth should not be permitted to supervise the wealth of millions of citizens.

Keep corrupt men and women away from Government House. The state treasury is not an inheritance awaiting a political family.

3. Reject Cronies and Small-Minded Egomaniacs
Nigeria must also keep cronies and small-minded egomaniacs out of public power.

Cronyism is the replacement of merit with personal loyalty. It occurs when appointments, contracts and public opportunities are distributed among friends, relatives, political financiers and praise singers rather than entrusted to people with the competence and integrity to serve society.

A governor who fears intelligent and independent people will surround himself with mediocrity. He will not appoint advisers who can tell him the truth. He will recruit flatterers who repeat his opinions and applaud his mistakes. Honest disagreement will be treated as betrayal, while blind loyalty will become the highest qualification for public appointment.

Under such leadership, government becomes an association of dependants. The state’s finest professionals are ignored while unqualified loyalists occupy strategic offices. Competence leaves the room, sycophancy takes the chair, and failure becomes official policy.

A serious governor must search for the best minds within and outside the state. He must appoint competent women and men, young professionals, experienced administrators and capable citizens in the diaspora. He must possess the confidence to work with people who may know more than he does.

The quality of a governor is often revealed by the quality of the people around him and by his willingness to hear truths that make him uncomfortable.

Reject the small-minded candidate. A person with a small mind cannot carry the large responsibilities of a state.

4. Do Not Use Government House to Rehabilitate Persistent Failure
A governorship election must not become a rehabilitation programme for people with long and unexamined records of failure.

A candidate may have worked in business, public service, the military, academia, law, the priesthood or another profession. Whatever the field, the candidate’s record should be examined. What institutions did the person build? What responsibilities did he discharge successfully? What happened to the people, organisations and resources previously placed under her authority?

Experiencing failure does not automatically disqualify a person from leadership. Every serious human being encounters setbacks. The important questions are whether the individual accepted responsibility, learned from the experience, corrected the underlying weaknesses and subsequently demonstrated competence.

The dangerous candidate is the one whose public record is marked by abandoned responsibilities, broken institutions, unpaid obligations and blame directed at everyone except himself.

A state is too important to be used as a laboratory for an unprepared governor. It is a complex political, social and economic community containing millions of lives and expectations. Its leadership requires an understanding of public finance, education, healthcare, agriculture, security, infrastructure, law, technology, investment and human relations.

Persistent failure in smaller responsibilities, when combined with arrogance and an inability to learn, can be amplified when greater power is acquired. An incompetent governor may transform personal failure into the failure of an entire state.

5. Reject Candidates Driven by Trivial Pursuits
Do not elect a man or woman whose life is dominated by trivial pursuits.

Some people seek power not to transform society but to enlarge themselves. Their politics is driven by vendetta, vanity and an insatiable appetite for personal recognition. They collect luxury vehicles, expensive watches, designer clothes and meaningless titles while schools decay, hospitals remain unequipped and communities live without clean water.

They embark on frivolous and endless travels at public expense on trips that produce neither investment nor development. They name public institutions after themselves and members of their families. They arrange honorary degrees they have not earned and confer upon themselves titles they do not deserve.

This I believe.