If the flag bearer of Nigeria’s ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in next year’s presidential election, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, thought a ‘placeholder’ would be a lightning rod, and perhaps soften the blow of his final decision, he has now seen that he is wrong. There is a storm brewing.

Tinubu’s decision on Tuesday July 12, 2022 to choose a fellow Muslim as his running mate has annoyed many Christians who represent nearly 49% of the country’s population. They are doubly upset that it took him five weeks after his nomination to decide what they had always suspected he would do: pick a Muslim running mate to complete what is now Nigeria’s first Muslim-Muslim ticket in nearly 30 years.

Why is the choice of Tinubu a problem? In a multi-religious and multi-ethnic country like Nigeria, where balance has become an article of political faith, they argue, it smacks of insensitivity for the ruling party to choose two of its leading candidates from the same religion. The unintended message is that adherents of other religions – even non-adherents of any religion – can go to hell.

It’s more than that, they insist. Besides religious disrespect, there is also the argument that the Tinubu camp’s assumption that Muslims in the North will not vote for a Muslim-Christian vote is baseless. They recall that Nigeria’s last President, Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian, defeated a Muslim candidate and was overwhelmingly installed by the Northern vote, a story Jonathan also shares with former President Olusegun Obasanjo.

And then there is the part that runs even deeper – the unspoken and deeply rooted resentment in Christian circles: Christians under President Muhammadu Buhari have been the victims of the most vicious and deadly attacks, often in an atmosphere which suggests if not official complicity, then at least narcissistic indifference.

It would be hypocrisy to dismiss these concerns or to respond to them casually that aggrieved persons should look elsewhere. Interestingly, those like me who think religion should have no place in politics are in the minority not just here, but around the world where, according to a 2012 Pew Research Center study, 5.8 billion people still profess their faith in a religion.

Two books illustrate this point eloquently: that of Francis Fukuyama Identity: contemporary identity politics and the struggle for survival, and Yuval Noah Harari’s epic, 21 lessons for 21st century.

While the former explains why identity politics is the new nationalism in modern politics, the latter berates secularists who are distraught over the grip of religion on politics.

Of the three spheres of influence of human development – ​​technical issues; political issues; and issues of identity – wrote Harari, while religion has receded in the first two, largely replaced by advances in research, science and rational thought with more beneficial results, it still dominates identity politics. Unfortunately, in this area where God is at the service of man, the result has been more harm than good.

Tinubu did not claim Harari in his choice of Senator Kashim Shettima as his running mate. He didn’t need it. Eight years ago, when he joined forces with Buhari to form the APC, which ended the 16-year rule of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), he told Buhari, who had agreed to choose as a running mate, that he had not done so. I don’t think a Muslim-Muslim ticket is a problem. In other words, for Tinubu, nothing has changed.

Yet he himself would admit that the country has changed. It has become far more ethnically and religiously divided than it has been at any time in recent history. It would be unfair to put all the blame on Buhari. The causes are both internal and external.

Moreover, Boko Haram’s redefinition of apostasy has injected more deadly tension into religious attacks than it was before Buhari took power.

But his nepotism and chaotic procrastination inflamed ethnic and religious politics. His style, if it can be called style, increased the salience and frequency of attacks to a level hardly experienced before or even considered likely. Tinubu, his biggest cheerleader, bears indirect responsibility for Buhari’s disastrous performance.

The consequences of this poor performance are that they have reinforced erroneous notions that: 1) there is a causal link between Buhari’s religion and the upsurge of violent Islamic extremism, particularly targeting Christians; 2) that a Muslim-Christian ticket is needed to mitigate this perceived tendency; and 3) that large swathes of Muslims have been spared the misery of violent attacks and mismanagement or have benefited disproportionately from the current dispensation.

The word “incorrect” honors these notions. They are simply absurd. If religion were the talisman against banditry, kidnapping, terrorism and all its hideous franchises, Buhari’s home state of Katsina – a predominantly Muslim state – would not be among the most beleaguered as it is. currently. Zamfara state in the northwest of the country is also reportedly not considering arming citizens to defend themselves.

Buhari’s famous magical hold over the millions of captives among the northern poor has been as useless in providing them with a better life over the past seven years as has been his adherence to his Muslim faith. Religion has failed its followers, as it inevitably does, leaving them with desperate hope and apologies.

And why, anyway, didn’t the current Muslim-Christian combination of Buhari and Osinbajo save Christians from attack, if such a ticket was the only remedy? I know as many Muslims who are absolutely dissatisfied with Buhari’s performance as there are Christians and non-believers who would be happy to crucify him if they caught him in a deserted street.

Unfortunately, where Japan’s Shinto religion has been lumped together to support development in one of the world’s most advanced countries, Buhari’s religion in Nigeria has proven a perfect alibi for his government’s incompetence.

I’m not saying there aren’t Muslims who have taken advantage of Buhari’s presidency in the same way a tyrant might use his notorious big brother’s name to terrorize the neighborhood. But these people did it not necessarily because Buhari is a Muslim, but more likely because his incompetence complicates them.

And what about the fact that Christians in the North voted Jonathan in 2011 and might have done so again if Tinubu’s running mate was a Christian? It’s a different ball game here. Jonathan and Obasanjo were the candidates, not the running mates.

A number of studies, including one of the most cited by Christopher Devine and Kyle Kopko, titled, Do running mates count, find it difficult to explain why such an insignificant position can at the same time be perceived as so significant. The authors found evidence of a limited direct effect on election results.

Any serious risk of collateral damage in the present case should be a valid concern for Tinubu and his party members. But such concern should not be based on emotions or what happened more than a decade ago, which may have been undermined by demographic shifts, on evidence.

By the way, I suppose that of the two candidates from the main political parties – Tinubu and Atiku Abubakar – if anyone is likely to be significantly affected by a shift in Northern allegiance, it might be Abubakar.

Raison? Peter Obi, his running mate in 2019, provides a powerful rallying point for Christians in the North, the Igbos residing there and across the country. If Tinubu is wrong in his electoral calculations, he will of course pay the price. But this, in my opinion, would not be the consequence of bad religious foresight, but of an error in electoral calculation and the sum total of what he represents as a candidate.

In a country with around 50-50 Christian-Muslim inhabitants, many Christian leaders and even ordinary Christians feel genuinely frightened, even offended, by the prospects of a Tinubu-Shettima presidency after that of Buhari. But there are also a number for whom having a “believer” on the ticket is only a matter of collective evangelization, a way of avenging themselves on opportunism.

Under Jonathan, for example, how did ordinary Christian worshipers benefit from the proliferation of private jets (among Christian clergy), a few of which were used to transport money and weapons in a regime of charge discretionary airport parking and waivers?

Tinubu is in this race to win. He would do what he has to do to win and if he thinks that means finding a Muslim or Buddhist monk to race with, that’s it.

Registered voters, on the other hand, are not left out. And the sooner they stop allowing special interests to swindle them by presenting Tinubu’s choice as grief, the better for them. As things stand, among the frontline parties, there are Muslim-Muslims; Muslim-Christian; and Christian-Muslim banknotes.

Unfortunately, instead of focusing on the wreckage of insecurity, poverty, unemployment, brain drain and debt that Buhari’s government will leave behind, we are chasing the shadows.

The only way to punish a candidate – because ultimately it is the candidate who bears the blame – is to measure them against the wreck staring us in the face. Voters can then choose, in their sights, the candidate who can start cleaning up the mess. DM