Nigeria

CHAPTER TWO

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK AND REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

LITERATURE REVIEW

Several attempts have been made by scholars to pin down the etymological meaning and nature of political crisis. Apparently, some scholars have argued that political crisis in the developing countries is part of institutional building and that it is still part of development while at the same time, its opponent constitute the bane of development of any country (Ome, 2004). To some, political godfatherism connotes the invasion of the political candidates by discarnate powerful sponsor, tending to complete possession for the purpose of selfish gratification (Mbamara, 2004, Bassey and Enetak, 2008). For them, the godfather is the political slave merchant while the godson is the political slave or slave boy or political article for sale. The godson is purchased with big sum of money under a democratic oath. Their aims and objectives include appointments, stealing, robbery and looting of government treasury. The decision making appointments and contract awards is usually manipulated by the godfather. In the words of Ajayi (2014), Chukwuemeka, Oji and Chukwurah (2013), godfatherism is a kind of; Politics whereby an influential person in a popular or ruling party will assist someone usually a lackey, i.e godson to emerge as the governorship candidate of a party at all cost and either by hook or crook, he will help him to emerge victorous in the state governorship election irrespective of whether he is a popular candidate or not.

Intuitively, political godfatherism represents a self-seeking individual out there to use the government for his own purposes. The cost of this incidence is enormous to the state as what usually obtains is that when the incumbent godson is at pains to satisfy the whims and caprices of the godfather among other competing demands on the scarce resources of the government, the interest of the larger number is savagely undermined. This according to Joseph...