By Rayyanu Bala

Partisan politics is, of course, characterised by rumours, propaganda and calculated misinformation.
But in pursuing these elements care must be taken to avoid breaking the hearts of supporters.
Every election brings with it a flood of “breaking news,” anonymous sources and social media claims designed to shape public opinion. However, sooner or later, facts have a way of catching up with fiction.
The publication of the final list of governorship candidates uploaded by the APC to the INEC portal, as reported by newspapers across the country yesterday, has settled one of the most debated issues in Nasarawa State politics. Senator Ahmed Wadada Aliyu’s name has been uploaded to the INEC portal, effectively bringing an end to weeks of speculation over former IGP as the APC governorship candidate.
For days, supporters of former Inspector-General of Police Mohammed Abubakar Adamu, particularly those in Lafia, celebrated reports that his name had been uploaded instead. The celebrations were fuelled by repeated claims and “breaking news” updates suggesting that the matter had already been decided in his favour.
As events have now unfolded, making a mockery of those speculations, there is a need for those who promoted them to reflect on the consequences of spreading inaccurate information.
The question at this juncture is: who benefits from spreading false information that later proves to be inaccurate? While political supporters are naturally passionate about their preferred candidates, there is also a responsibility to avoid creating false expectations among them. This type of misleading information, which kept supporters celebrating for over a weeks, does little to strengthen their confidence. Instead, it breeds confusion, disappointment and mistrust.
One cannot help but conclude that such harmful misinformation is capable of doing more harm than good. By constantly promoting false narratives among supporters just to keep their hopes alive is dangerous. It can only do good temporarily, but reality cannot be avoided. The danger of sustaining false hope is that, when the truth eventually emerges, the consequences can be severe and, in extreme cases, may even lead to the loss of life.
At the end of the day, facts remain stubborn. As the saying goes, truth has a way of prevailing, and when it does, misinformation is left with nowhere to hide.