Omachoko
Omachoko
Aug 22, 2017 · 2 min read

(Not) too broke to run you say? (Deuxième Partie)

“Politics has become so expensive that it takes a lot of money even to be defeated.” ~Will Rogers

Last week, I wrote the prequel to this article in an attempt to counter some of the cynicism which trailed a major milestone in the quest to amend the Nigerian Constitution. Yes, the successful passage of the Not too Young to Run bill in the Senate. I got this as feedback on Twitter, from my friend They call me Jay

At first, I tried to defend my position with good reason, because my intention was to solely attack the cynicism and nothing more. However, a number of people seemed to agree with his response so I figured I ought to outline my thoughts on campaign financing.

First and foremost, campaigns of any kind cost money. There is the overhead cost of campaign staff, logistical costs, campaign paraphernalia expenses, the cost of video and audio production amongst others. In the Nigerian context, there is the cost of freebies like rice and other food items (not sure if this is ethical or if it should be acculturated as such).

So how do young Nigerians with little or no financial clout contest in this system? Here are a few ideas:

1. Push for the Not too Young to Run amendment to survive the whole process.

2. Push for the independent candidacy option as it will make it easier for younger candidates to have a platform to run with fewer barriers.

3. Leverage on the crowd funding and sourcing platforms that we already have like, Gofundme, Twitter etc.

Thankfully, world class payment solution platforms are currently under construction locally. One good example is what Flutterwave has built and is building.

The 2015 elections showed a little glimpse of what is achievable using tech to fund a campaign. We’ve seen that the best way to organise around this is to form Political Action Committees or PACs. These are campaign organisations that pool money and resources together for or against a candidate or a measure.

They have, of course, been made popular by the American political system.

So are we too broke to run? The answer is yes! Is there is a solution to campaign funding? The answer is also yes.

We must learn to play the long game and most importantly we have to learn to iterate the change we want to see. Let’s win councillorship and local government elections first, then we can use it as a pilot before running for governorship and presidential elections.

I know that there are structural issues with our lower tiers of government, but we need to start from somewhere.

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Omachoko

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Omachoko

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