2023 Elecions and Citizens’ Mental Wellbeing
By Adewale A Soremekun JP
About four decades ago, I had a disagreement with my mother on an arithmetic assignment I got from school. She had checked my books and queried why I left one question unanswered. I responded that the teacher made a mistake.
I added cockily that it was impossible to take three away from two. She smiled and retorted that the arithmetic expression two minus three (2 – 3) had an answer. And it was minus one (-1).
Tried as she did, I could not quite understand her angle. In my simple mind, I was just stuck with the ‘fact’ that it is impossible to take away a higher numeral from a lower one.
Seeing my confused face, she gently cuddled me, patted my back and said reassuringly “take it off your mind for now, cheer up, you will understand it when you grow older”.
I got it less than a year later.
It is April 2023 and the Nigeria 2023 general elections have come and gone. Yet some compatriots are still stuck and seem unable to move on.
The keenly contested 2023 presidential election attested to a fact that the candidates, at least, the three leading ones all command huge followership —to such degree that the eventual declaration of the winner left quite a large number of supporters with a feeling of loss and disappointment.
However, what ought to be transient is lingering longer than it should, and is being accompanied with deeds and acts that range from noble to ignoble and sometimes to acts that give rise to doubts on the mental wellbeing of the majority of the populace.
While it is natural for the winners and their supporters to celebrate their victory; it is also hoped that they would curtail their exuberance and not allow their jubilations to escalate to destructive levels.
Taking a cue from that, it is also imperative to point out that too much happiness tends to go hand-in-hand with depression.
In 2011, Iris Mauss, a psychologist at the University of Denver, published a study titled ‘Emotion’.
The study, which involved 43 female subjects, showed that being too happy could actually lead to sadness later on. Thus, it then can be inferred that relishing election wins too much can be a harbinger of depression when raised hopes therein are dashed later on.
On the other hand, the losing side is susceptible to despondency and a recourse to violent reactions. They are quite likely to sink into depression.
With all hopes seemingly lost, the losers can easily slip into a state that impairs their ability to think, feel, process or respond to life situations in appropriate ways.
No doubt the general elections and the controversies that trailed the declaration of the results, especially that of the presidential contest were quite traumatic.
The obsession of the supporters and fans, too, to latch unto any and all inordinate propagandistic memes, downright vile and abusive language to members of the public with differing opinions, appalling laziness to research and cross check the misinformation their principals wittingly impressed upon them to peddle is increasingly getting unhealthy and quite frankly insane.
In 2018, while speaking at a Commonwealth Business Forum in London, President Muhammadu Buhari made a comment that was widely interpreted as derogatory towards Nigerian youth. He opined that Nigerian youth are lazy.
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I, particularly felt slighted at the unfair generalization. So, when I had an occasion to discuss it over dinner with my parents and I stated my displeasure at how seniors like the President ignore the significant contributions young Nigerians are making in the society, one stern look from my father somehow made me recall my mother’s 1986 advice of “take it off your mind, cheer up, you will understand it when you grow older”.
I get that too, now.
If a child known for failing in little things, puffs up and trumpets “his one or two big achievements”, the elders who know that – it’s the little things in life that, all summed together, become bigger and more important than the big things and events – can readily envision how even bigger and better the child’s “big” achievements could have really been if he paid rapt attention to all the little things before him.
Indeed, I believe some Nigerian youth are lazy in the littlest of things. Imagine just how lazy a people can be, when jesters have them peddle, defend and fight over misinformation like ” a certain professor has been silent in Buhari ‘s 8 years administration and he is now suddenly finding his voice against one of their choice candidates”, when a simple google check of the said professor’s comments on President Buhari would suffice to unearth the factual truth!
How idle and lazy some must indeed be when suddenly cyber sniping becomes a craze to live for and prowling the cyberspace to devour people during and after interactions with quick attacks, use of rude comments and biting mockery now becomes a worthwhile enterprise.
Equally worrisome is the frightening thought process of the debased minds of some party fanatics. An example of which was the traumatizingly brazen violence displayed by alleged political thugs at polling units and other areas across the country on election days.
Violent acts such as shooting at other persons, hacking at them with machetes, and other forms of assault and battery for pecuniary inducements are not actions of a mentally healthy citizenry.
These acts cannot and must not be condoned, lest they become the new normal.
The ministry of National Orientation Agency of Nigeria (NOAN) must be proactive on this. The mental wellbeing of the citizens is being toyed with and gradually eroding. These little faux pas can become big disasters in the future.
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a condition that is not ordinarily associated with the fallouts of an election process, but the manner the politicians whipped up sentiments in this year’s election to get citizens’ emotion dangerously invested in the election outcome is yielding symptoms akin to PTSD, especially from those whose hopes were dashed.
Although the progression is slow now, it is evolving and if not checked, it could snowball to a silent, unhindered and gradual degeneration of the moral compass of the citizenry.
The ministry cannot afford to brush aside, dismiss or ignore these red flags because of their potential to grow worse with time.
It is important to start now and begin to roll out programs geared at teaching among other things the sanctity of human life, the blessedness and unity in diversity, as well as the good and desirable fruits of peaceful coexistence.
The ministry can also up the ante by engaging well versed content creators and reputable social media influencers to aggressively promote contents to teach that failure and challenges are part of human life and that healthy and positive thoughts are necessary while good sleep helps the brain restore itself.
These programs must also encourage the boldness to overcome stigmatization for people brave enough to go for help, and to identify and keep away from bad company.
I posit now is the time to apply the timely stitch that saves many.
God bless Nigeria.
