Politics of Stomach and Physical Infrastructure

A Barometer for Good Governance in Nigeria

Abstract

The house hold prayer of every Nigerian is “give us this day our daily bread” Men celebrate being given fish to eat, as against being taught how to fish. The proponents of stomach infrastructure believe that government cannot be investing heavily on physical infrastructure when the stomach is empty, both stomach and physical infrastructure need to be addressed side by side. The avenue to mobilize party supporters in Nigeria is to sell their votes to the standard-bearers of the party; the easiest way to organize meetings or mobilize people to attend political rallies and campaigns is through stomach infrastructure, with the slogan use what you have to get what you want appears to be the cache. Many serving political class reveal that every day of the week from dawn to dusk, their political supporters and constituents’ members besiege their homes and offices for one support or the other. These people are not meeting their political representatives to advocate for the entire local constituent needs or welfare, instead their personal needs such as school fees for their children, house rent, and financial support for the new awaiting bride, assistance for funerals and other mundane requests takes the centre stage. This has not improved the living standards of all Nigerians in service delivery (physical infrastructure) to the people. Nigerians like the biblical Esau are selling their birthrights for a mesh of porridge. The main objective of being in politics is to improve the welfare of the masses but these has ceased to be as instant political gains takes over the stage. It is now money for hand, vote for ground’ and the citizenry who benefits from this largesse are prepared to go extra mile to achieve their goal. Using descriptive-analytical method the paper investigate stomach and physical infrastructure side by side as a gateway to national development in Africa with particular reference to Nigeria. It is the opinion of this paper to conclude that balancing stomach and physical infrastructure must go hand-in-hand to enhance good governance. The political class will no longer subject the electorates to hunger, joblessness, poverty wages, hopelessness and a bleak future.