How Primordial Sentiment And Blind Followership Are Fueling Nigeria’s Governance Crisis -By Isaac Asabor

Nigeria’s governance problem is often framed as a leadership crisis. Politicians fail to deliver on promises, public funds are mismanaged, infrastructure decays, and insecurity festers. The focus, usually, is on the leaders themselves. Yet this analysis is incomplete. The uncomfortable truth that many Nigerians avoid is that bad leaders do not rise and thrive in isolation. They are enabled, sustained, defended, and repeatedly recycled, by followers whose loyalty is rooted in sentiment rather than substance.

In a functioning democracy, the relationship between leaders and followers should be dynamic and accountability-driven. Citizens evaluate performance, demand transparency, and exercise the ultimate power of the vote responsibly. In Nigeria, however, a significant proportion of followers support politicians for reasons that have little to do with competence or governance. They prioritize identity, patronage, or short-term gain, all while remaining vocal critics of the consequences they themselves helped to create.

The cycle is familiar. Election campaigns erupt with promises of prosperity, security, and national development. Supporters enthusiastically endorse politicians, often suspending scrutiny or rational evaluation. Rallies become festivals of loyalty, social media platforms amplify partisan defenses, and critics are attacked for questioning the competence or integrity of leaders.

Once elections are over and reality sets in, roads remain bad, public wages unpaid, insecurity escalates, the same followers begin to lament governance failures. The paradox is striking: the complaints come from the very people who, through repeated support, allowed leaders with poor records of accomplishment or questionable integrity to assume power.

This is blind followership in its rawest form: loyalty without accountability, sentiment without evidence, and identity over competence.

One of the most powerful enablers of poor governance in Nigeria is political patronage. In a system where access to contracts, jobs, and necessities is often mediated by political connections, followers sometimes support leaders not out of conviction, but to secure material benefits.

Election campaigns become marketplaces. Cash handouts, food items, and other inducements influence votes, particularly in communities grappling with poverty. While the immediate reward might be tempting, the long-term cost is high. Leaders who invest heavily in winning votes through patronage often treat public resources as personal assets. Corruption becomes rationalized, and governance suffers. Yet, when the consequences emerge, followers frequently express outrage without acknowledging their complicity in enabling the very system that fuels mismanagement.

Beyond patronage, identity politics remains the most destructive form of followership in Nigeria. Ethnic, religious, and regional affiliations often determine political allegiance, displacing merit, competence, and vision. Many voters elevate candidates simply because they “belong to the group” or are seen as “one of us.”

This dynamic has predictable results. Leaders, confident that loyalty is guaranteed by identity rather than performance, feel little pressure to deliver. Failure is reframed as persecution; criticism is interpreted as an attack on the group rather than a demand for accountability. Citizens continue to defend poor governance under the guise of group solidarity, while national interests suffer.

The danger is clear: when primordial sentiment drives political choice, governance becomes secondary, and systemic failures persist unchecked. Hunger, insecurity, poor healthcare, and failing education systems do not respect ethnicity or religion, yet allegiance to identity often blinds citizens to these realities.

Poverty intensifies the problem. In economically disadvantaged communities, followers may prioritize immediate survival over long-term national interests. Political actors exploit this vulnerability by offering small, short-term incentives that sway voting behavior.

The consequences extend far beyond individual elections. When political offices are secured through vote-buying or transactional loyalty, governance becomes a secondary consideration. Leaders feel entitled to extract wealth from public resources to recoup political investment. Followers who sought temporary relief or reward are left paying the price in persistent infrastructural decay, inflation, and social instability.

Nigeria’s information ecosystem compounds the issue. Followers often receive information filtered through partisan media, social networks, or politically motivated narratives. Misinformation, propaganda, and selective framing shape perceptions of leaders and their performance.

Instead of critically assessing claims, many followers amplify them. Dissenting voices are labeled unpatriotic, disloyal, or “agents” of opposition interests. A culture of blind defense emerges, insulating leaders from accountability and normalizing poor governance. Over time, even rational critique is drowned out by the noise of sentiment-driven loyalty.

Perhaps the most corrosive effect of blind followership is the normalization of mediocrity. Corruption, mismanagement, and lack of accountability become expected rather than exceptional. Phrases like “they are all the same” or “at least they tried” reflect low expectations that benefit no one but failing leaders.

This cycle erodes the social contract between leaders and followers. Citizens begin to tolerate what they should resist. Leaders no longer fear electoral consequences for failure, and governance standards decline. In essence, followers become enablers, and democracy, instead of being a tool of accountability, becomes a ritualistic exercise with predictable outcomes.

The solution begins with followers. This is as democracy grants them the ultimate power, which is invariably the power and privilege to vote. Nevertheless, wielding it responsibly requires discipline, information, and moral courage.

In terms of prioritizing competence over Identity, followers must evaluate candidates based on vision, integrity, and capacity to govern rather than ethnic, religious, or regional affiliation.

Most importantly, voters must learn to reject patronage Politics. This is as short-term financial incentives should never dictate political choices. In fact, long-term national interest must outweigh temporary personal gain.

Also, is the area of demanding accountability. Therefore, voters should hold leaders to their campaign promises and public responsibilities, using both electoral and civic tools to enforce standards.

In a similar vein, followers should always resist manipulation. This is as critical consumption of information is essential. Therefore, followers must scrutinize narratives, question propaganda, and reject emotionally driven loyalty that blinds them to reality.

Engage Beyond Elections: Democracy does not end at the ballot box. Civic participation, community advocacy, and public discourse are vital to reinforcing accountability between elections.

Looking at democracy in this context as a shared responsibility, it is not out of place to opine that governance is a two-way street: leaders mirror the priorities, values, and compromises of those they serve. Not just inept leadership fuels Nigeria’s persistent governance crisis, but also by blind followership and loyalty to identity over competence. Until voters demand ability over sentiment, substance over spectacle, and accountability over patronage, the cycle will endure. Bad leaders do not rise alone; they are sustained by followers who tolerate, excuse, and rationalize failure. True democratic renewal will not come from politicians alone; it will come when citizens exercise their power deliberately, resist sentimental loyalties, and insist that public office is a platform for service, not survival. Until that shift occurs, complaints about corruption, inefficiency, and insecurity will remain loud, persistent, and fundamentally hollow. Followers, as much as leaders, must change.