PATRIOTISM is defined by the Webster Dictionary as “a zealous love of one’s country”, while the Oxford Dictionary defined it as “devotion to one’s country and concern for its defence”.

Patriotism involves a zealous love, devotion to, and concern of a citizen for the unity, continued existence,and particularly for the defence of his country against any aggression, be it local or external.

All actions that lack a zealous love, devotion to, or concern for the defence of one’s nation, could be described therefore as un-patriotic, and such actions include , seditious acts and utterances, hate conducts and behaviours, ethnicity,racism, religious intolerance, sabotage of the defence and economic plans of a nation, and election rigging to name a few.

Nigeria has laws and enactments to deal with all criminal and unpatriotic acts, but politics have become a big wedge against the full application of the weight of such laws.

In politics democracy is good, for, it involves all the mechanisms that allow a people to choose how they are governed, yet even in democracy, politics become bad because bad people in politics carry out unpatriotic acts and go unpunished, by making the system weak.

In Nigeria, one method, which has been exploited by bad people to escape from being punished by the law, for unpatriotic acts, is by creating and belonging to various ‘cults’ of retired generals, garrison commanders, economic vampires, clerics clubs, ethnic lords, former and incumbent leaders in the states and federal government. The incumbent leaders hide under the immunity clause in our constitution to loot the treasuries of governments, and empower individuals with their wealth, instead of building structures, because structures will become strong and question their unpatriotic conducts. These men are waxing strong now in Nigeria.

African nations that made the mistake of building individuals than structures and ended up as war theatres include Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan, Central African Republic ,Lybia, and Liberia.

Nigeria had found favour with God, so far, in dealing with such strong individuals and characters whenever they came up in the past, but we must not stretch that luck too far with the elections 2015.

The development of any individual or group mentality of indispensability must be discouraged in this election. If nothing else, fairness in the seemingly accepted rotation of power between the zones of Nigeria need to be maintained.This is where the full implementation of the 2014 Confab Reports become very key in our choice of who leads come March 28.

Politicians start to plan how to win the next elections from the date they are sworn into office, and the bad ones may defect from one party to another, kill opposition elements, burn houses and business places of opponents, kidnap, use youth cultism, and hoodlums under any guise, criss-cross religious boundaries, threaten hell fire, shout slogans, and do anything imaginable just to win their next election.

In Imo State for example, we find a Governor, who after crossing over four political parties, arrived in Government House on the platform of APGA, broke his agreement with APGA, tried to kill APGA in the State, and in the process ended up with APC, and wants the people to let him continue without questioning him on integrity, consistency, stability, and future of the Imo people within the Igbo Vision, and the national political arrangement. It will surely be improper to let him into another term, without dealing with these issues or he will be let to go, because the future of Imo is bigger than any one man’s ambition. It is patriotic to continuously question such men, at all levels.

At the national level , we find people coating out right rebellion with politics, and call it opposition. They have dressed rebellion in the garment of opposition politics; first, during the 2011 presidential election, General Buhari, GMB, threatened that blood would flow if he lost, and when he lost, Boko Haram suddenly blossomed and blood has been flowing till now mostly in the North East,yet nothing happened to him.

Second, Governor Amaechi of Rivers State has threatened that they would form a parallel government, if they lost in this election, and nothing happened to him. Meanwhile, there is so much violence in his state.

Third, electoral violence which has been reduced under GEJ’s administration, has been unleashed against GEJ’s campaign train in Katsina, Plateau, and Bauchi States all in the north, nothing happened to any opposition leader, while PVCs are released in discrimination against non-indigenes in Lagos till now.

Fourth, GMB who declined to attend any presidential debate in Nigeria chose to go to London, to give a presidential address to foreign media, and to people who will not vote in the elections.

So far, both to local and foreign media, GMB has not been able to come out in clear terms to say how he will stop insurgency, deal with many issues bedeviling our economy and even how he will fight corruption, especially as most rich members of his party are perceived as very corrupt.

Fifth, Governor Fayose of Ekiti state, recently, made unsavory comments about GMB’s health, his Party the PDP distanced themselves from that comment, but GMB threatened to pull out of the peace accord he signed in January in Abuja, rather than deal with Fayose. What will follow if GMB pulls out of the peace accord, but violence?

Last week, Dame Patience Jonathan,the president’s wife, told her listeners in a campaign rally , to stone any opposition member that visits them for votes. She was talking to women, and in the South where there have been no violence involving women and will never be.

Last year, she cried as a mother,that “there is God” over the wicked handling of the abduction of the Chibokgirls.The opposition made a huge entertainment joke out of that cry,thereby killed the message from it, through their social media blitz, and while our neighbour Cameroons organized a March to support their military and discourage their youth from joining Boko Haram, our opposition is more interested in taking the same Dame Patience to the ICC! Where is patriotism in all these?

Mr. Clement Udegbe, a legal practitioner, wrote from Lagos.