Nigeria’s ruling party, the All Progressive Congress (APC), recently announced that it has tagged the price of presidential ticket for the 2023 elections $100 million, the most expensive in Nigeria’s history and the highest among the political parties.
The decision, which has generated a lot of criticism from members of the public, has put the Party in a spotlight. The criticism has been largely based on the concern that the office of the president is being commercialized.
However, the APC has defended the decision. The party has said that the price isn’t much for anyone vying for the office of the president. The APC national publicity secretary, Felix Morka, said on Monday during an interview with SIlverbird Television, that anyone who does not have the “sufficient base” to raise N100 million has no business being in the race for Nigeria’s presidency.
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“I hate to use the US as an example. The ability to raise funds is a clear criterion whether or not you are eligible to participate at the primaries and the debate especially.
“You aspire to run for the highest office in the land, you should have some appeal, some reach to members of the party. Sell your ideas, sell your vision.
“Forty-five million people giving you N1, do the math and see what it comes to. That is a lot of money. We do have that possibility,” he said.
He added that although, within the Nigerian context, N100 million is a lot of money, the party has commitments and “we do not have any statutory funding as you know.”
“Within the context of Nigeria, N100 million is a lot of money. Those who seek the office around the country are expected to have a sufficient base, otherwise why would you aspire to be president, if you are that obscure or unsupportable by your party members and the electorate?” he said.
Where Nigerians’ issues lie.
Nigeria has been bedeviled by poor leadership exacerbated by corruption since its independence in 1960. A parcel of that ordeal is the high cost of governance amid scarce resources. Against this backdrop, the idea of selling a presidential ticket N100 million is not only seen as cynical, it’s also seen as fuel for corruption.
Nigeria’s president annual salary is N14 million, according to the information on the website of the Revenue Mobilization Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC), an office statutorily empowered by Section 32 (d) of Part 1 of the Third Schedule of the Constitution to determine the remuneration appropriate for political office holders. This means that for the four-year term a presidential candidate will lead the country if he eventually wins, he could only earn N56 million, just a little above half of what he spent to purchase his form alone.
It is thus believed that a presidential aspirant who has no intention of embezzling public fund, will not spend N100 million purchasing the form.
The APC, in its defense of the price, had said that the money could be crowd-funded, taking the burden off the contestant’s shoulders – thus eliminating the tendency of corruption. But critics said that the Nigerian political ecosystem does not have the crowd-funding culture for elections, and in addition, the presidential ticket is just the first money move before the campaigns that will eventually gulp billions of naira.
The campaign, which is seen as spreading as much money as you can to buy votes, is usually funded by a circle of supporters who are expected to be replenished from the government’s coffers if their candidate wins. This political culture has fueled the criticism trailing the ruling party’s decision to hike their ticket fees for aspirants.
The call to reduce the cost of governance in Nigeria, which is said to be among the most exorbitant in the world, weighing the country’s economy down, has been on for long. Nigerians believe that the message the APC is sending by its decision is that the government is not ready to reduce the cost of governance or fight corruption.