In 1995, I walked into one of my classes and stated thus: “nothing short of a revolution will save Nigeria from its socioeconomic doldrums”. While I expressed my preference for non-violent revolution, I offered that if it takes a full-blown bloody revolution that I am for it and that if it takes the extermination of every Nigerian from age forty-five and above to turn around the society that I am for it. Given the fact that Nigeria was under the claws of a military despot extraordinaire, my students were very surprised by the audacity of the averment. The  intellectual banters that follow such radical pronouncements ensued and stretched for fifteen minutes of my two-hour period. Then, one student asked: “why forty-five years?” and I threw the question back to the class. The guesses were wide, wild, way out and prolonged until I said: “because I’m forty-five”. The surprise on their youthful faces gave way to total shock. The silence was thunderous!
For a decade thereafter, I experimented with that scenario inevitably adjusting the age upwards. I observed that the shock on the students’ faces decreased over the years. Irrespective of the empirical evidence of decreased shock, which is attributed to the variables of “age” and “democratic dispensation”, there was consistence, over the years, in the desire for a drastic change in the system. In other words, the students unanimously expressed desire for drastic change in the affairs of Nigeria.
Stepping out of a state appointment, which gave  me a hands-on knowledge of the mechanism and goings-on in government, I wrote an academic article titled as above in 2003 and sent it for publication with the required assessment fee. Shortly thereafter, the article was accepted and I paid the publication fee. Within the week, the editor called and asked if I was sure I wanted the article published; he harped on the topicality and sensitivity of the article, especially in view of the fact that Nigeria had just commenced democratic governance after prolonged military authoritarianism; he also reminded me that authors are held responsible for the content of their work not the journal. Slightly agitated, I said, “I have paid the relevant fees” and then I asked sarcastically, “what else do you want me to do?” The article was published by Nigerian Business and Social Review Vol 2 (#2) July 2003:178-186).
Today, almost three decades after the encounter in class and two decades after the publication, I can still see the shock on the young faces of those students, in my mind’s eyes.  And today, as a septuagenerian retiree, whose stake holding on earth  is relatively limited, I am sitting comfortably  at the Departure Lounge of Life with my boarding pass in my enfeebled hand waiting for the frigid voice of nature to announce my departure. I make bold to say that if peaceful revolution is not allowed, then Nigeria is in for a violent revolution such that will dismember  the nation.
The outcome of 2023 Election will either make or break Nigeria; there are no two ways about this. If Peter Obi wins the election, that would commence the peaceful process of taking power away from the predator pack of parasitic politicians, who have run down the nation’s economy by weaponising poverty, religion and ethnicity for their political gains; there and then, Nigeria will have a chance of experiencing positive change that will unleash the globally acclaimed potentials of Nigerians towards reanimating the dead economy and positioning Nigeria in its rightful place in the comity of nations; this would be the peaceful revolution.
Conversely, Atiku or Tinubu victory has the potency of polarising this polity on the precipice along the line of haves and have-nots. Obviously, they will rule based on the self seeking and self serving “Emi Lokan Mentality” and the same old fabricated falsehood that enables the rich to economically emasculate and enslave the sons and daughters of the poor so they would sustain their obscenely  ostentatious lifestyle and hegemony of hereditary plutocracy.
The characteristic chicanery, cavalier and corrupt practices of Nigerian politicians clearly indicates their lack of patriotism and sensitivity to the needs of the people. Noam Chomsky holds that “a lost nation is one in which hungry and jobless people blindly support those responsible for their poverty, agony and misery”. Plato, admonished that “if you  do not take an interest in the affairs of your government, then you are doomed to live under the rule of fools”. Albert Einstein said that “the world will not be destroyed by those who do evil, but by those who watch them without doing anything”. It is said that those who do not learn the lessons of history are bound to repeat them. Again, we learn either from our experiences or those of others.
Inspired by the above averments by Chomsky Plato and Einstein, which are obviously products of experience, I once wrote that “Nigeria is not being destroyed by politicians; rather, it is being destroyed by the comfortable elites who are too scared to raise their voice and the masses including youths who continue to elect them irrespective of their dismal and abysmal performance in office”.
2023 elections will provide Nigerians a veritable opportunity to choose between good and bad governance based on the known characters and track records   of the various contestants. This submission is concluded on the words by Bright Amirize and Dele Farotimi, who have expressed strong opinions on the state of the nation vis-a-vis the forthcoming election. Amirize, a retired lecturer at Rivers State University, opines that Nigeria is standing  “at a crossroads, whereby the old order must give way to a new order”; a definition of revolution. And Dele Farotimi, a detribalised Nigerian, who tersely prophesied that “Peter Obi represents the last opportunity for those who ruined Nigeria to get out of power without bloodshed”; a clear allusion to the prospect of the preferred peaceful revolution without  discountenancing the possibility of the  bloody alternative . Reacting after a visit by Peter Obi, the spokesman of Arewa offered thus: “I spent valuable time with Mr. Peter Obi today. I wish those who see him as an ethnic candidate can get to know him better. I hope the nation will see [him] up close, we could see a [peaceful] revolution”.
Finally, Nigerians should be introspective in making a choice in 2023. There is the need to be guided by wisdom, foresight and forethought realising that to be led by a thief and/or a liar is to opt for theft and/or lies to be the order of the day; the new norm. No society grows under the leadership of dishonest people. Nigerians must rise in unison and stop the streak of scoundrels systematically sinking the ship of state.

By: Jason Osai

Osai is a university lecturer.