"Public Office, Private Wealth, and the Death of Accountability"
Wike’s recent declaration — “I spent N50bn to make Bola Ahmed Tinubu president and I won’t be dumped like that” — did not land like a bombshell; it floated into the national conversation like an old, familiar song. It sounded less like a scandal and more like a civics lesson on how power truly changes hands in Nigeria. Whether he exaggerated the figure or not almost feels irrelevant. What unsettles the mind is how easily such a claim slips through the public space without shock, as though he merely stated the price of garri in the market. In any democracy where votes truly reign, this kind of statement would invite outrage, investigations, and resignations. In Nigeria, it elicits resigned nods. That, in itself, is the first sign that abnormality has become the new normal.
In truth, Nigerian politics has long muttered its allegiance not to the people but to the highest bidder. The political arena resembles a vast, noisy marketplace where power is the ultimate commodity and politicians are both hawkers and buyers. Elections, on paper, are supposed to be solemn rituals of popular sovereignty; in practice, they often play out like auctions where influence is traded, loyalty is priced, and outcomes are negotiated behind curtains thick with cigarette smoke and whispered promises. Citizens line up at polling booths to cast their votes, yet the real power-play unfolds far from those queues — in hotels, mansions, and backrooms where the ballot is reduced to a mere receipt confirming a deal already sealed.
Within this distorted ecosystem, politics has become shamelessly transactional. Wike’s alleged N50bn is presented not as a moral outrage but as a “stake” in a high-risk, high-return venture. Support is no longer anchored on principles or ideology; it is treated as capital. Politicians invest in candidates, parties, and coalitions the way speculators invest in stocks, hoping for dividends in the form of appointments, contracts, concessions, and immunity. Loyalty, in such a marketplace, does not spring from belief but from expectation. It is less an oath and more an invoice, stamped with the words: “Payment due upon victory.”
Thus, Wike’s alleged gamble fits seamlessly into a broader culture where backing a candidate is akin to buying shares in a political enterprise. The question drifting through public discourse is not, “Is it right for a politician to spend such an amount?” but, “What did he get in return?” The compass of public morality has been spun so many times that it now points only toward profit and loss. The language of governance has been infected by the vocabulary of business: investments, returns, portfolios, negotiations. Politics, as practiced, has become a stock exchange of ambition, with the nation itself offered as collateral.
Yet beneath the loud trading floor of this political marketplace lies a quieter, more haunting question that rarely gains voice: where does this kind of money come from? When a public office holder speaks casually of sinking billions into an election, the most urgent interrogation should be about the source of those funds. But in today’s Nigeria, that question often arrives dead on arrival. Society has been slowly anesthetized, numbed into perceiving unexplained wealth as a natural fragrance of power. It is as if opulence has become the uniform of leadership, and no one dares ask who paid for it.
In this climate, public office is no longer viewed as an opportunity to serve, but as a rare mining license: time-bound, but infinitely exploitable. A politician may enter office with modest means and depart with an empire; vast estates, fleets of cars, offshore accounts, and businesses stretching like tentacles across sectors. The wealth amassed is sometimes so enormous that it could sustain not just children and grandchildren, but descendants yet unborn — a river of stolen abundance flowing into generations that may never know the honest sweat of labour. Public office becomes a hurried harvest, a frantic digging before the term ends and the golden shovel is taken away.
This is where “Public Office, Private Wealth, and the Death of Accountability” takes center stage. The state’s resources, meant to be a communal granary, are turned into private barns. The treasury becomes a free-for-all field, trampled by those in power who graze as though there will be no tomorrow. The funds that should build schools, hospitals, and roads are diverted to bankroll elections, purchase delegates, hire thugs, launch propaganda, and sustain a network of political clients. Corruption, in this scenario, is not a side effect; it is the fuel that powers the engine of electoral victory. It becomes a ruthless cycle, a serpent devouring its tail and growing fatter with every bite.
As this cycle deepens, the value of the ordinary voter shrinks. When money is allowed to choke merit and muscle out integrity, the will of the people becomes a faint whisper drowned by the thunder of cash. Citizens may queue for hours under a scorching sun, ink-stain on their thumbs as proof of duty, yet the true decisions might have been made weeks earlier in plush rooms where envelopes change hands and agreements are scribbled over dinner. Democracy, draped in its ceremonial robes, becomes a masked ball — glamorous on the surface, hollow at the core.
This is why Wike’s words, instead of igniting a firestorm of national outrage, merely fan the embers of cynical recognition. They expose a reality Nigerians have long suspected: that governance is treated as a transaction, and the nation as a negotiable asset. The collective reaction is not one of astonishment but of weary familiarity — as if someone simply turned on the light in a room everyone already knew was dirty. The question on many lips is not, “How dare he?” but, “How many others are doing the same without saying it?”
From this point, frustration often hardens into bitter resignation. Nigerians watch the revolving door of politics spin the same faces in and out of office, like actors swapping costumes but rehearsing the same script. Anti-corruption efforts wobble like a one-legged chair — firm only when leaning on the weak, but strangely gentle when pressed against the powerful. Institutions meant to safeguard the public trust often bow before godfathers and strongmen. In such a setting, hope grows thin, like a cloth washed too many times. The belief that a person of integrity, with little money but great vision, can win an election starts to sound like a bedtime story told only to comfort children.
Yet, beneath the sediment of despair, an unyielding truth persists: no democracy can flourish where individuals tower above institutions. When alliances overshadow laws and personal promises outmuscle constitutional provisions, the system inevitably bends toward the wealthy and well-connected. As long as the real contest is waged not in polling units but in boardrooms, the average citizen remains a spectator — applauding or protesting from the stands, but rarely allowed to touch the ball. The stage may be arranged to look democratic, but the script remains stubbornly oligarchic.
So, the heart of the matter is not whether Wike’s figure is accurate to the last naira. The more piercing question is why such a statement glides so easily into the national consciousness without provoking widespread moral revulsion. It tells of a country where political greed is woven into the very fabric of governance, where public funds are mentally reclassified as personal spoils the moment a hand rests on the Bible or Qur’an at inauguration. It sketches the picture of leaders who view legacy not as the schools they build or the lives they uplift, but as the sheer magnitude of wealth they stockpile — wealth designed to cushion their descendants from the necessity of honest labour for generations.
In the end, Wike’s alleged N50bn claim is less a personal brag and more a mirror reflecting the rot in Nigeria’s political culture. It exposes a system where politics has become a cash-and-carry marketplace, public office a doorway to private riches, and accountability a casualty of normalized corruption. Until Nigerians recover the capacity to be outraged by such revelations, until institutions outgrow strongmen and votes outweigh bank transfers, democracy will remain largely theatrical — impressive on the surface but decayed underneath. The real task is not just to fault Wike’s words, but to challenge and reform the very system that makes such words sound normal, and to rebuild a culture where public office is treated as a sacred trust rather than a lucrative investment.
EBIKABOWEI KEDIKUMO – writes from Ayakoromo Town, Delta State.
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