There is a peculiar brand of honesty that only slips out when an official forgets to read the democratic script. Usually, freshly inaugurated politicians feel obliged to rehearse the standard civic pieties muttering something about service delivery, the rule of law, or the sovereign will of the people. But every once in a while, the system produces a moment of pure, unvarnished clarity.
Behold the newly minted Chairman of Esan North-East Local Government, stepping up to the microphone fresh from his swearing-in, visibly bursting with gratitude. One might naively expect a pledge to fix broken roads, tackle municipal rot, or account for council allocations. Instead, the gentleman laid bare the exact architecture of political survival. With unwavering earnestness, he unveiled his holy trinity of allegiance: absolute loyalty to the Executive Governor, Senator Monday Okpebholo; unwavering loyalty to the party hierarchy; and unyielding loyalty to his own family members for seeing his personal ambition through.
Notice who did not make the guest list: the citizens of Uromi. The actual electorate was entirely absent from his roster of accountability. In their place sat a candid declaration of servitude to the gods who truly matter in modern statecraft, the godfather who confers the ticket, the party brokers who enforce the machinery, and the household syndicate that cheers the windfall. To praise Governor Monday Okpebholo for treating newly sworn in councillors and chairmen “like his own children” is to concede the entire game: governance at the grassroots is no longer a democratic mandate, but an exercise in patriarchal patronage.
This spectacle does not happen in a vacuum. It is the predictable harvest of an electoral process thoroughly insulated from public consequence. When state leadership governs as a tributary outpost, where political tenure is treated as an extended thanksgiving service to godfathers in Benin and patrons in Abuja, the subordinates naturally mimic the routine. Loyalty flows upward toward the throne; accountability never trickles down to the streets. We are treated to the absurd theater of quotas, sycophancy, and promised multi-million-vote bounties concocted from thin air, while local administration decays into a personal reward scheme.
When a public servant explicitly informs you whose interests he intends to protect, it is wise to believe him. The people of Esan North-East were not promised representation; they were simply notified that the court has appointed its new steward.
Centre for Nigeria Progress 