League of Nigerian Democrats
Vision and Mission Statement
League of Nigerian Democrats are seasoned advocates of a nascent democracy. It waters its true nature; liberalness, social equity, fairness in representation and distribution of its welfare packages to affect all states in Nigeria. Top on the list of its objectives is to encourage and promote good governance, while frowning at undemocratic democracy through all law-bound possible means at our disposal, with valour and loyalty to the league. The win-or-die leviathan attitude of our political parties cm patriots is of course disheartening, destabilizing and a disgrace to democratic splendor and aesthetics. Also, our political elite’s noxious sacred-cow syndrome of not allowing our women participate fully in politics is democratically porous and dogmatic, and it contravenes the franchise right to vote and be voted for, notwithstanding the sex. It also contravenes articles 1 and 2 of the Universal Declaration of human rights, thus:
Article 1
All human beings are born free and equal
in dignity and rights. They are endowed
with reason and conscience and should
act towards one another in the spirit
of brotherhood
Article 2
Everyone is entitled to all the rights
and freedoms set forth in this
Declaration, without distinction of any
kind, such as race, colour, sex
Stating therefore, that women be given more political roles is but stating the obvious. And as Sojourner Truth rightly says, “If the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn the world upside down all alone, together Women ought to be able to turn it right side up again”. A man at best could be an individual but a woman is always a nation and experience has proven that just as breast is natural to a suckling baby, so is the leadership of women to nation-building. Taking into cognizance this truism, it becomes plausible to say that it is high time Nigeria produced females in sensitive positions. In any case, notwithstanding the dangers in our polity today where men of guts would just vanish for simply standing for the truth. Again, noting that democratically minded groups that should have been unbiased in their dispositions have ended up regrettably irredeemable in the tent of a particular politician/political party is a disgrace to democratic aesthetics and splendor is noting a spade a spade. This trend is sad and from the past experience of democracy in Nigeria, there should be mental repositioning from sentimental to credibility politics. As a result, the league admits that the cog in the wheel of democratic progress in the state and Nigeria at large is not ignorance but inaction. To therefore stand tall and speak to a fault, from an objective point of view, we have refused to soil ourselves with any individual or group to avoid favouritism-got-so-cheap may be by money. Membership cuts across tested, energetic, Benue-loving democrats, unionists, politicians, political scientists, industrialists, philanthropists and academicians etc. within Nigeria and in diaspora. To conclude, in a democratic setting like Benue, where democracy cries for greater expression, the need has only become eminent for the electorate to have a voice and a feel of good governance and not just what is obtainable in the air, papers or what have you which most times is a sharp deviation from realism, qualified by George Orwell’s adjective in his 1984 as double-speak. And politics itself become constructively competitive to enhance more growth, development, and improvement in the political, cultural and socio-economic well-being of her citizens.
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Comrade Isa, Major
