WITH the new found power of the electorate to determine the outcome of elections in Nigeria, the race for the 2019 elections have effectively begun – that is, if the perception of Prof. Attahiru Jega’s election is truly free and fair.

In other words, the electorate is looking out to judge performance of our elected officials in the next elections, if the general public is not aware of this, those in the social media have already began the countdown.

There is no time to wait, the people are impatient and craved for changes and if they do not see any, they will crave for another change.

That is why the take-off of our elected governors in this present dispensation is being brought into focus; it is never too early. There is this general rule that the quality of the foundation determines the ultimate shape, strength and resilience of the structure. If the foundation is bad, nothing good can come out of it. It will be like a house founded upon sandy soil and when it rains the whole structure collapses.

From what we have seen and experienced since May 29th when the new dispensation took off, it is as if, some of our elected governors have gone on leave after the hectic schedule of the electioneering campaigns, only a handful have hit the ground running. What could be responsible for this? Is it that, there was no plan of actions before the elections? g Or, they got into the race just to grab political office for themselves? Or, they simply lack focus?

Even before the APC’s  chants of change, the change phenomenon was already here with us, through the vibrant the media, especially the social media forum and which, chain reacted to the awareness of the general public. So, it was not unusual to find people, especially particular ethnic groups threatening to take their destiny in their own hands. Furthermore, the drastic crash in our earnings from oil, with its resultant  effect on the exchange rates, general inability to meet up with the people’s economic expectations, coupled with the profligate displays and insensitivity of our elected representatives to the needs of the people, all of these made this change inevitable.

Therefore, at this time of our country’s economic history, only a focused, creative, intelligent, detribalised and unbiased leadership can make it work for Nigerians. How many of our present elected governors fit into this categorisation? To me, only a few.

Although I have followed his activities over the years, I have never been a fan of Nasir EL-Rufai, because of the perceived high handedness with which he ran the affairs of the Federal Capital Territory as Minister and the streak of megalomaniac displays that he has put up a couple of times but, give it to the gentleman, he gets things moving.  Once he sets his goals and believes in the rightness of his course as it affects the efficient running of his government, he would move mountains to accomplish it, no matter whose ox is gored. This is the kind of person we need in all strata of government. Majority of the elected governors have been sleeping this past one month, they should wake up and take a cue from El-Rufai.

Nasir El-Rufai –as they say, hit the ground running, with a full realisation of the precarious cash situation, he slashed his remuneration and his deputy, and followed that up with the streamlining and rationalising of government ministries and limiting the numbers of personal aids and assistants, removing loopholes for waste in the fertilizer distribution, holy pilgrimage sponsorship and others. What bold moves. The icing on the cake is the quality and calibre of people that he is bringing into his government to effect the much desired change. Whether one is a Christian, Muslim, northerner, southerner, he does not care, so long as the individual would add value to governance. He is trying to revive the textile industries and encourage further research into ethanol fuel production through sugar cane. All of these in one month, while some of his colleagues, even the ones in their second tenure are pleading with the people for patient and running cap in hand to President Muhammadu B uhari to help bail them out of their mess, what rubbish!

Only a blind, deaf and dumb man will not see success ahead of El-Rufai’s programmes in Kaduna state. I have stated in a previous article that we cannot afford to wait any longer, asking us to wait is creating room for excuses and excuses do not get work done. We have seen that in previous governments, it did not work for us. We must therefore discourage this practice of asking for time each time a new government takes over. Start working immediately, the people will see action and be convinced.

As a result of the manner they got in there, some of our governors are still thinking of ways to pay back all the money they borrowed  for election campaigns or are been hassled by so called godfathers and sponsors, that is why, three months after the elections have been concluded, some of them cannot constitute their cabinets.

Government is in place to help the people, what we are witnessing now in Nigeria is government imposition of its burden on the people. Why should a governor  keep a fleet of helicopter when the state cannot afford to pay workers’ salary? Why can’t they draw from security votes to assist in payment of workers’ salaries? As it is now, revenue accruing to the Federal government and states have dropped significantly, we require new methods to forge ahead and any state governor  still looking up to the federal government for bail out is in a dream world.

The quality of take off since May 29 has exposed those who came into government prepared with goals and missions and those who did not. The wheat is being separated from the chaff. Those of the governors lagging behind must know that Nigerians are beginning to understand the power of the voters’ card as the 2015 elections have brought about that awareness, they cannot wait for 2019 to use that power.

It is very important for our governors to know what they are contending against; principally, the state of our economy. If the economy is fixed, all social, political and infrastructural dislocations will follow suit.

States must begin to look inwards for self sufficiency and respect.

Sunny Ikhioya, a commentator on national issues, wrote from Lagos.