We had to stay up all night to watch 22 presidential aspirants speak and then wait for over 2,000 delegates to vote using paper like it was 1980. But the All Progressives Congress’ (APC) national convention has finally ended after three days. 

We observed a few things.

Everybody loves kissing Buhari’s ass ring 

If you took a shot each time an aspirant mentioned Buhari’s name during their pitch to delegates, you’d be blind drunk before the first 10 of them had spoken. Actually, you’d have liver damage if you took those shots during Ikeobasi Mokelu’s speech alone. Most of the aspirants were neck-deep in Buhari’s rectal sanctum, so it’s understandable the president’s face looked like this for most of the night. 

Everybody hates bulk SMS

When he climbed the podium for his final address to delegates, Pastor Tunde Bakare switched on his best Martin Luther King impression to toast them. But while his opponents were sending credit alerts in dollars to these delegates, he announced that he sent bulk SMS to them instead. 

No one was surprised he got zero votes, but he got some online love for remembering the victims of the massacre in Ondo State.

Ben Ayade is basically Shakespeare

The bar is underground, but Senator Professor Ben Ayade, the governor of Cross River State — as he loves to be called — is easily the Shakespeare of his generation. In his speech to delegates, he talked about the “concept of Afghanistanism” and how he intends to fight insecurity with “satellite videography”. We don’t know what any of those things mean, but they were provocative and got the people going. It was giving a secondary school debate. 

Tein Jack-Rich talks too much

When he climbed the podium to address delegates, not a lot of people knew who Tein Jack-Rich was. By the time he was done, we discovered his mother’s natural brilliance brought all the boys to the yard, three different men promised her marriage, impregnated her and all abandoned her. Then, a man who would later become his father, who retired early from the Army because of a bullet wound, rescued her from the streets, but also left her eventually because, well, everyone leaves. Jack-Rich was also in primary school till he was 15 years old before he moved to the city and then became a rich man. 

All of this could have been a Twitter thread or a smashing Asaba Nollywood hit, but Mr Jack-Rich paid ₦100 million to tell it to delegates who said, “Touching story, but you no do transfer.”

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Ahmad Lawan thinks he’s Joe Biden

Senate President Ahmad Lawan’s pitch for the presidency was that developed countries usually elect senators as presidents. He pointed to Joe Biden and Barack Obama as shining examples of senators who became presidents. The only thing he forgot was that he’s not Joe Biden, and no one thinks about Nigeria at the mention of “developed countries”.

Osinbajo wants to send black people to the moon or something

Vice President Yemi Osinbajo is proof that you can get away with anything as long as you have a sweet mouth. When he shared his vision with delegates at the convention, you’d be forgiven for forgetting — for a moment — that he’s been part of the current government for the past seven years. One of the highlights of his address was sharing his vision that Nigeria could become the first country to send a team of black astronauts to space by 2040. We don’t want to be accused of being small-minded so we won’t laugh at that vision. But hopefully, we can hack 24/7 power supply first so that our ship doesn’t get stuck in Mercury retrograde.

Nigeria remains motherless

Other than calling delegates “Naijas”, Uju Ohanenye stood out at the APC convention as the only woman in the race. “Mama don come on board. Everything go better,” she said with the air of someone addressing their starving children at the dinner table. She said she only joined the race because Nigeria needs a mother, but then stepped down for… Tinubu just moments later. The search for Nigeria’s mother continues.

We can’t trust anything Onu says

Remember how Buhari’s campaign team promised to make ₦1 the same as $1 only to deny it after winning the election? We didn’t think anyone would make that mistake ever again, but the former Minister of Science and Technology, Ogbonnaya Onu, took a step further: he promised to make the naira even stronger than the dollar. This is the same man who promised to localise the production of pencils and failed to deliver that after seven years. We believe him as much as we believe in the government’s poverty alleviation schemes.

Tinubu wants to carry Nigeria’s problems — even though his hands can barely hold anything

Tinubu’s ideal candidate for Nigeria’s next president is someone who’s willing to carry Nigeria’s many problems on their head. And, of course, he nominated himself to be that person, even though his hands were shaking like a mini Tiger generator for the herculean task of flipping the page of his written speech. He won APC’s presidential ticket at the end of the convention and we frankly don’t know what to learn from that other than when it’s your turn, it’s your turn. Good luck to everyone involved.

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