Throughout history, human beings have been guilty of lying, cheating, betraying themselves and stealing for personal benefits at the expense of others. This is treacherousness. Treachery describes behaviour or actions involving betraying trust or loyalty with malicious intent. Political treachery is the violation of trust by politicians which undermines the foundational principles of democracy. Elected officials are expected to act in the best interests of their constituents, and when either they, or appointed political office holders, prioritise personal ambition over public good they are treacherously eroding the trust that is essential for good governance.

The synonyms to treachery are infidelity, betrayal, treason, duplicity, perfidy and disloyalty. In criminal law,  treachery refers to methods or means of committing crimes that ensure success without risk to the perpetrator. In Dante’s inferno and his described circular descent through hell, he reserved the ninth circle – the lowest, blackest, and farthest from heaven – for the sin of treachery. In his opinion the worst sinners were traitors who betrayed their loved ones, their country and their God. As far as he was concerned, treachery isn’t just a crime, it is a sin from the heart. Treachery can be closely related to treason which is the act of betraying one’s country or sovereign. There is no specific crime of political treachery but increasingly Nigerians are questioning the loyalty, and patriotism of their political office holders.

The teachery dudplayed by today’s political office holders involves routine sedition, deception, deceitfulness, dishonesty, duplicity, faithlessness and traitorousness. Principled Nigerians believe that when elected politicians abandon the party to which they swore allegiance, then they have abandoned the platform under which they competed and must resign to seek re-election on the new platform. Such principled behaviour is alien to Nigerian politicians who are reluctant to bring hardship upon themselves by being principled, making sacrifices, serving the interests of the citizenry and foregoing personal gains.

It’s abundantly clear that many of today’s politicians  have neither the personal principles nor the honest desire to serve the public. The tragedy of modern day Nigeria is that the nation has a paucity of political office holders with integrity, credibility, consistency, spiritual values and an honest desire to serve the people. Current Nigerian political office holders have no hesitation in turning renegade. They are experts in the components of treachery which are malicious deception, and betrayal of trust. Betrayal in politics takes many forms. At its core it involves the act of deliberarely misleading people for personal gain through lies, trickery and dishonesty. Betrayers will turn their backs on one another, abandon any previous conviction or affiliations, violate our confidence and habitually disregard our trust for their personal gain. It’s become evident that relying on the hearts of political office holders is not the best way to govern in our democratic society. Regrettably, the law doesn’t serve justice on those who engage in political treachery. This is why political treachery has become the order of the day and has led to the current disillusionment and disengagement from politics by the electorate. The nation’s political actors should be aware that their unending political treachery runs the danger of leading to social unrest, protests and even conflict.

What is really lamentable is the dearth of men and women of principles who contest for political office armed with the vision and compassion to uplift the majority who live below the international poverty line and halt the national decline. Most of today’s political office holders think of only themselves and how to take care of their personal problems instead of making sacrifices and striving to solve the problems of underdevelopment. Their disloyalty to the nation is evidenced by subversive behaviour, corrupt practices, dishonesty, cheating, lying and stealing.  The perilous state of the nation is ample evidence of the many shortcomings of our political office holders. Citizens are hard pressed to name any of them who display a consistent degree of loyalty to the people whom they are supposed to protect and serve.  As a group our political office holders have lost both their credibility and the trust of the nation. Nigerians are now stuck with mediocrity when choosing candidates and representatives to elect.

The nation’s political space is saturated with stories of betrayals by political actors decamping from the platform under which they were elected, or fighting their benefactors,  to the detriment of the electorate. The consequence of Nigeria’s routine political betrayal is that voters have become cynical, disillusioned and apathetic. As a result more and more Nigerians believe that they are wasting their time voting, and fewer and fewer of them are participating in elections. Addressing political betrayal will require a concerted effort to restore trust and accountability in governance. This can be achieved through increased transparency, stronger ethical standards for politicians, and a mechanism for holding leaders accountable. Dictatorships have never been a good strategy for resolving fundamental human inequality, injustice and the core problem of evil in society. All dictatorships have led to the sort of inhuman horrors, cruelty beyond measure, deception disregard for human rights, disrespect for the rule of law and  decay of morality being witnessed in our current democracy. If Nigeria is to get itself out of the mess the political class has landed us in, political treachery must become a thing of the past and the bar of individual political standards must be lifted instead of being routinely lowered.