Most politicians are lions. Lions do eat like every other person, politicians do too, and we also do too. Lions walk around the jungle, politicians walk around places too, they even travel far to walk far, no doubt – we do too. Enough of what we do, politicians do and lions do. You might not be a politician and possess the feature of double identity but now I am strictly talking about double identity in the politician’s nature.
Before you might get confused, let what I mean by double identity be shielded out. Changed identity as a result of change in location is the unique feature of lions and politicians, on another thought, let me say most politicians.
The degree of double identity might vary but it exists. Just like the daylight, we can see it, we can feel it. Should I say we can touch it? At least some touch it, instead of a civil servant working in a state government owned secondary school to be touching fat wads of notes, he keeps touching slim wads of note every end of month as a result of no payment of salaries or half payment. That is a typical condition of a Nigerian working in public sector – unpaid salaries up and down. Yet, our big men are seeing what civil servants see extra-ordinarily expensive as extra-ordinarily cheap.
Enough of sideway attractions, a visitor at the zoo, maybe UI zoo, I don’t know, was chatting with the keeper of the lion’s den. “I have a cat at home”, said the visitor, “and your lions act just like my cat. Look at them sleeping so peacefully! Why put them behind bars?” The keeper laughed, “These may look like your cat, but their disposition is radically different. They look like your cat outside but they are lion inside. You had better be glad the bars are there”. Mere looking at that exposure, should we be glad the bars are there? Absolutely NO! Because it prevents us from knowing their true nature from that their second nature.
Those lions are likened to politicians, most politicians as the case may be. They have different natures at different places but still remain their selves. Politicians greet you, hail you, promise you, give you souvenirs, care for you, help you… but upon the move from common man to the corridor they upload a new nature. When they have used the masses to rise, they turn to something else-a lion! They become fierce. Anyone who criticizes is terrorized, anyone who claims they do badly is punished, and anyone who tries to expose them is witch-hunted. They tend to be seen, not every time as we see them before, but now rare in a blue moon maybe when they want to launch a substandard but vocal and widely known exaggerated project. That is how they use to do.
Senators, representatives at both the federal and state level, who we see every day before ascension into the power. Those who claimed that the people’s welfare is their priority, those who claimed to be responsible to the people at the grassroots, those who promised to help improve the water system and road of their districts when we felt the pain together but now that there is change of location, they change their identities. They have all left their local communities and ran to Abuja; those in the state ran to the capital to update their status and standard of living. They no more feel from our pain; they no more experience power outage, they no more fall into pot holes while driving; when we greet them. They wave at us from the end of discussion car but it is more than that, connotatively, they say “bye bye”. Some kind ones try and do some projects and even forget its maintenance after execution and it becomes the talk of the town, yet, people of that community will be wondering, “what has he done that people are hyping?”. Their promises while contesting is far from the reality they follow when elected. It is all about their double identity.
For any politician, I believe basically that they have two identities. The one he shows when he is contesting and the ones he shows when he gets what we want. That is, when he gets to the corridor of power. Power, soon corrupt them. After getting the mandate to rule, they become oppressor and behave with great negligence to the welfare of the people. It is believed that some politicians are quite unique and specially made that they are always well and doing no matter how. It is believed that they only have a single identity. It is okay but I have not seen one. You can be a politician with different in our generation. Yes!, you can do it. Start now and be upright! May they not influence you!
[Nucleus]
