The Masses: The Cardigan of Our Oppressors

By DR. Jalarth Uche Opara

Yesterday, I made a post suggesting the possibility of Bola Ahmed Tinubu being the only candidate in the 2027 presidential election and nobody would cough. My analysis was anchored on the visible, and often frustrating, laissez-faire and lackadaisical attitude of the average Nigerian on the street toward the unbearable and intimidating dominance of our political class—a group that is not up to 2% of the population.

The response I received was overwhelmingly positive. By my own estimation, the post achieved its purpose: to awaken awareness of the unused power of the masses. A power which, if properly harnessed and coordinated, would leave our oppressors stranded—like fish out of water, like drenched rats scrambling without direction.

The truth is simple: no politician is powerful without the enablement of the masses. They are not self-sufficient; they are not islands. What they are, the masses sustain.

Who drives them? The masses.

Who cooks for them? The masses.

Who secures them? The masses.

Who runs their daily lives? The masses.

Their existence revolves entirely around the people. they breathe the oxygen the masses provide. Remove that oxygen, their power suffocates.

They are empty without the masses. Their nakedness is covered by a cardigan—and that cardigan is the people.

Until we realize this, and become deliberate in using it as a strategic tool to reclaim our voice, we will remain what we have been: a garment covering their shame, a willing set of hands fetching nuts from the fire for them and their families while our future, and that of our children, slips quietly away for the crumbs we gather from their overflowing tables.

Imagine, for a moment!
A politician wakes up one morning to find no driver.
No cook.
No security personnel.
No aides.
And every attempt to replace them is met with silence no one shows up.

Think of a man like Bola Ahmed Tinubu without the loyalty of his security detail. Imagine him without the obedience of drivers, without the machinery of loyal aides and political followers. However powerful he believes himself to be, the quiet resistance of the masses would render that power hollow almost impotent.

The day the masses unite ,shedding tribal sentiment, political party loyalty, religious bias, cronyism, and ethnic prejudice and instead wear the uniform of patriotism, equity, justice, fairness, and competence. On that day, regardless of whose ox is gored, the illusion will shatter.

The emptiness of power, even when wrapped in wealth and influence, will be exposed. For too long, they have worn the cardigan of the masses.
2027 must be the year we yank it off.

Enough is enough!!
The Masses massive power remains underutilised. The power sedimented in the masses very raw and inflammatory. The question is who would stir this sedimented power? Who would strike the first match to ignate the inflammation? We all lie like sheep, looking without vision. Who would push this masses into consciousness, nudging them into activism that would hunt the hunter? Nobody would do it except three persons. Until you, I and we become conscious of the deprivation you, I have and we have suffered and how our collective indolence has empowered them to subdue us and our generation unborn we wouldn’t lift a finger to act.

Let me shock you. Peter Obi wouldn’t do it for us. He isn’t the Messiah. In all of us is the Messiah that would deliver us from the hands of this deadly hunters of destinies.

We can ! If we collectively set out to do it ! The power in us very massive and our Cardigan we would pull out from their body.

2027 isn’t for armchair WhatsApp critics, it isn’t for those whose bellies are their gods, it is equally not for comment readers’ association. It is to the best of my knowledge and conviction those who are restless with the terrible burden placed on their necks by our political shylocks, who take pleasure in the pains and woes of the masses.Until we become restless, to them we would always be their slaves and them our slave masters. We have talked enough. Analysed far too much. Action, coordinated action , a panacea to all these rubbish of our political class.

2027! A YEAR OF MASSES ATTENUATION OF THE EVIL EXPLOITATION OF OUR POLITICAL CLASS. ARE YOU GAME?

THOUGH WE PRAY AND FAST LOOKING UP TO GOD FOR HELP. HOWEVER, OUR DUTY WE WOULDN’T OUTSOURCE TO GOD

*Jarlath Uche Opara is a creative writer, an author, a columnist and political and social analyst*.
@ Facebook Jalarth Uche
Jarlathuche@gmail.com