The Kogi Equity Alliance’s latest political audit does not read like an ordinary report; it detonates like a controlled political explosion, unveiling a state caught between a citizen-driven renaissance and a power establishment increasingly addicted to intimidation, manipulation, and the archaic culture of raising political lords. What emerges across Kogi is a landscape where the people are surging forward with civic clarity, while the political class clings to habits that belong to the fossil record of democracy. Instead of encouraging the electorate, injecting new blood into the political bloodstream, championing transparent processes, expanding civic participation, and strengthening the ideals of free and fair elections, the state’s power brokers remain obsessed with gatekeeping influence and manufacturing godfathers; a political reflex wholly incompatible with a modern democratic state.
Across Kogi East, this tension is unmistakable. The people have not simply aligned behind Hon. Murtala Yakubu Ajaka; they have redeposited their democratic sovereignty in him through what KEA describes as a ballot-powered civic uprising. Villages, wards, and polling units echoed a unified mandate, and INEC’s IReV mirrored that sentiment with clinical clarity. Yet, rather than embracing the electorate’s emphatic voice, elements within the state apparatus appear more invested in undermining the legitimacy of this democratic surge. In a healthier democracy, such an uprising would be celebrated as political evolution; in Kogi, it becomes grounds for suspicion, containment, and the unmistakable stench of political witch-hunts masquerading as governance.
In the Central zone, the paradox deepens. Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan’s ascent, affirmed at the polls and twice ratified in the courts; should stand as a triumph of institutional resilience. Instead, it has exposed the fragility of a system that still bows to unelected influence. Her victory shattered the spine of a political dynasty that once believed itself immortal, and in its aftermath, the region has awakened with democratic self-awareness long suppressed by fear. Yet the state responds with narrative engineering, administrative obstacles, and the tried-and-tired repertoire of political muzzle; an unmistakable pattern of targeting reformist voices rather than embracing them. Natasha’s rise is not merely a win; it is a statement that the Central has outgrown the politics of imposition. But the establishment’s response reveals a deeper truth: some actors would rather haunt the corridors of power as shadow sovereigns than adapt to the people’s new political consciousness.
Kogi West provides the final movement in this unfolding democratic symphony, anchored almost entirely by Distinguished Senator Sunday Steve Karimi, a figure whose integrity has become the region’s stabilizing gravity. KEA’s field data shows that the West is not standing because of party structures but because Karimi’s moral consistency has become the last dependable compass in a region weary of coercion. Since his resonant Kabba Day speech; a speech that sliced through the political atmosphere with the audacity of truth. Karimi has operated as both statesman and sentinel. He commands loyalty without theatrics, unity without intimidation, and influence without entitlement. In a political climate where raw power is often flaunted like a trophy, Karimi’s brand of calm, measured leadership feels almost disruptive. Yet even he is navigating a terrain where principled voices are treated less as assets and more as adversaries in an environment still intoxicated with cults of personality.
What Kogi desperately needs now is a political system that understands the moment. This is not an era for gatekeepers; it is an era for nation-builders. Not a time to enthrone political demigods, but a time to resurrect democratic norms. As Lord Acton warned, “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely,” yet Kogi’s political class behaves as if this warning were a footnote rather than a fundamental law of governance. Instead of reinforcing intimidation, the state should be reinforcing institutions. Instead of narrowing leadership pipelines to a select cabal, it should be democratizing opportunity for young, competent, and visionary citizens eager to serve. Democracies thrive when citizens shape the system, not when the system suffocates the citizens. They advance when the ballot is treated as sacred, not when it is manipulated like a chess piece on a board owned by a few.
The KEA verdict is more than a regional scorecard. Infact, it is a mirror held up to a state standing at a democratic crossroads. Muri Ajaka in the East, Natasha in the Central, Karimi in the West: three leaders elevated not by coercion but by conviction. Three signals that the people are rewriting the political architecture from below. The question is whether the political establishment will evolve with this moment or cling to the ruinous politics of witch-hunts, gatekeeping, and pseudo-sovereigns. The future of Kogi will not belong to those who control the ballot process, but to those who respect it. It will not belong to those who coronate lords, but to those who cultivate leaders. The people have spoken with clarity; history now waits to see whether the system will finally learn to listen.
– Inah Boniface Ocholi writes from Ayah – Igalamela/Odolu LGA, Kogi state.
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