A teardrop, as I left my polling centre
I was not there in 2019. I was too distraught to venture out to cast a vote. I knew it was going to be a farce. I had in 2011 and 2015 voted right there at the back of my residence. Lucky for me, my polling centre was right there in the public primary school behind my house. Walking down my street and turning around to enter the school premises was less than a five-minute walk. This year, it would be a 15-minute drive, but that urge to share in the optimism out there was irresistible, even if I felt it was another dream that would laugh in our faces in no far distance. And I drove the whole stretch from Gudu to Wuse Zone 6 Abuja. And there seems to be on the streets that intense optimism - or is it just hope - that this could be different. I counted four security checkpoints, mounted by women and men of the Nigeria Police, the Civil Defense, and the Federal Fire Service. All were civil, and all appeared high on some positive energy. Taking another route, a longer one and counting this ...