Tricky art of campaign rallies

The most visible element of the Nigerian political season is the rally, and until last Saturday when the ruling APC launched its presidential campaign with a rally in Kaduna, most Nigerians thought the campaigns had not started.

A political rally is a tedious undertaking. It involves securing a venue, usually a stadium or a large open space; adorning it with flags and banners, getting security agencies to sweep it for explosives and then guard its surroundings; decorating adjoining city streets with banners, deploying thugs to guard the banners lest rival gangs tear them up, move thousands, or even tens of thousands, of party “supporters” to fill the venue, wave flags and shout party and candidate slogans, then bring in dancing and singing troupes to add colour to the occasion. Lastly, eloquent party leaders and the main candidates must get their thoughts together and say something meaningful at the rally.

How difficult is it to organize a rally? Not very, according to what an experienced politician once told me. We had just attended the launch of a governor’s reelection campaign rally, and I found myself departing from the venue in the State Assembly Majority Leader’s car. I complimented him on the success of the rally, but he said, “It is not difficult at all. All you have to do is to deploy hired buses at town motor parks, say whoever enters a bus, it will take him to the rally venue and back, that food will be served in the bus and everyone will get 5,000 naira, then inside the bus you distribute posters and banners to them. Once you arrive at the venue, they will jump out and shout themselves hoarse. So it is not really difficult, once you have money.”

How much money? Ahead of APC’s Kaduna rally last Saturday, a “memo” by Kaduna State Governor Uba Sani, supposedly sent to APC campaign director general Abdulazeez Yari, went viral on social media, saying N2.3 trillion had been released for the event. It turned out to be an artfully placed hoax. Kaduna State government said its combined three years’ budgets did not amount to that much, so there was no way it could spend such money on a single rally. There is however no way to know how much was actually spent, to prepare the venue, arrange food, accommodation and security, mobilise and move the huge crowds that attended the rally. Certainly the expenses were “decentralized” [to borrow a phrase from Prof M. J. Kuna], since every state contingent must had been financed by its own governor and party leaders.

How much political impact does a rally make? The most obvious one is to impress town folks and, through TV images and social media, other Nigerians as well, that the party is popular. But not always; local folks have a good idea how the crowd was mobilised, how much was given to each rally attendee and the singers, and whether or not they actually support that candidate or they were just guns for hire, because they will return home and tell stories to their friends and relatives. A rally is also meant to intimidate opponents; although they know that it is not an accurate measure of political popularity, they feel challenged to mount a similar spectacle lest people get the impression that their own party is not popular.

In mounting dazzling campaign rallies, ruling parties, especially, seem oblivious to the danger that they may instead convey to the public an impression of opulence and waste. A convoy of one hundred or more vehicles, mostly jeeps, luxurious Coaster buses and limousines, with security vehicles endlessly blaring sirens, could give down-and-out townsfolk the impression of elite opulence, instead of an impressive political outing. They may think of fuel price of N1,400 per litre and wonder how much fuel those vehicles needed to get there.

The rally may be the most conspicuous element of a Nigerian political campaign, but it is not the only one. Ahead of APC’s Kaduna rally, its VIP campaign team visited important clerics and traditional rulers. It is an old tradition, with some changes; back in the Second Republic, three of the five presidential candidates [except Malam Aminu Kano and Chief Obafemi Awolowo] made the palaces of traditional rulers the first stop when they visited every town. Locally it is symbolic, because by visiting the royal father, the politician is seen to “respect” the community. Yet, traditional rulers are supposed to be strictly non-partisan, to receive every candidate who visits them, but to refrain from endorsing any candidate. It is a tricky business, because traditional rulers often fear incumbents or they feel obliged to support those who appointed them. Besides, some candidates also splash money around the palaces they visit, making courtiers to shout their praises.

On the flip side, how much “truth” should a traditional ruler tell a visiting candidate, without being seen to humiliate him? A viral social media post recently showed a prominent Northern emir telling a visiting campaign team that they only come looking for support every four years while local folks are in IDP camps or are held hostage in bandit camps. It was unusual; a Northern emir’s normal script during such a visit is to pray for peace in the country and pray for the visitor’s safety and good health. The “truth,” such as it were, can be told by taking the visitor into the palace’s inner recesses, out of reporters’ earshot.

Campaign teams have also been seen visiting prominent clerics. Clerics, too, are supposed to be non-partisan, since their congregations are often a political mixed-bag. In reality, many of them stray out of line. In 2003, LP presidential candidate Peter Obi got a lot of bashing for a leaked “Yes Daddy” phone call to the leader of a mega church. On the Muslim side, the most controversial cleric has been the Jos-based sect leader who has been intently campaigning for the “Muslim/Muslim” ticket, even though it has receded to the background in most Nigerians’ political reckoning. After four years, the Christian community probably saw no harm in the ticket beyond the symbolic, while the Muslim community laughed that it brought no special advantages. Perhaps, a future Christian/Christian ticket would elicit no special controversy.

This year, several groups have jumped into the fray to compliment the efforts of political parties. They include Arewa 4 Asiwaju, led by former Kano State governor Malam Ibrahim Shekarau and made up of a dozen other former governors and ministers; City Boys Movement, apparently promoted by the president’s son Seyi Tinubu; PBAT Door to Door Movement, supported by First Lady Remi Tinubu; Tinubu and Mbah Move [ATM], promoted by Minister of Science and Innovation Dr. Kingsley Udeh, as well as the opposition Tinubu Must Go [TMG] movement, quite prominent on social media and in some states.

Nigerian youths eagerly welcome the onset of political campaigns and rallies. Youths are the ones with the numbers to fill stadiums and city squares; they are the ones with the time, the energy and the dare devilry to jump, sing, dance, cling to the sides of speeding vehicles, race across cities on motorcycles, shout themselves hoarse at rallies, guard posters and billboards, if necessary clash with and chase away thugs deployed by opponents. All because they can do with some naira notes dished out by rally organisers, in these hard times.

Chinua Achebe said proverbs are the palm oil with which words are eaten. Money is the grease with which the political machine is oiled. In 2023, when Central Bank threw a spanner in the works by changing the currency ahead of an election, a prominent North Eastern state governor running for reelection told me that he had to suspend his campaign tours for a week because he had no cash. Campaign vehicles were already lined up and ready to go, when his party chairman came and asked the governor if he had cash. He had none, but suggested they could send out money by transfer. The chairman said, “Your Excellency, let us suspend the rally. Dancers, singers and thugs cannot be paid by transfer. Most of them have no bank accounts.”

Where in all these is the place of records of achievement and promises for the next governance period? Surely, incumbents reel out projects that they say they did in the last four years. At APC’s Kaduna rally for instance, Works Minister Dave Umahi reeled out the length of roads he said the Tinubu Administration built. Since roads are the most tangible of government projects, road users all over the country were either nodding in agreement or shaking their heads in disbelief.

As for promises, APC and Tinubu Administration were completely upstaged last month by ADC presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar’s promise to restore fuel subsidy if elected. Removal of fuel subsidy is the Administration’s single most unpopular deed, and most citizens blame it for the current socio-economic hardship in the land. Atiku’s promise to restore it was a master stroke. Never mind if the promise will be hard to keep; most folks are just happy with it.

The challenge facing all the major candidates, as the campaign season finally picks up, is to sit down with teams of clever intellectuals, grassroots politicians and publicists, and work out mouth-watering campaign promises that immediately capture the public’s imagination. Trouble however is, a lot of water having already gushed under the Nigerian political bridge, we are able, given a candidate’s previous record, to determine if indeed he is capable of or can be relied upon to fulfill a mouth-watering campaign promise.