The first Presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump in the race to the White House has just been concluded.

While we thoroughly enjoyed it and learnt a new thing or two, the biggest secret we have managed to uncover by following the debate is that our leaders have, all this while, been taking notes from Republican candidate, Donald Trump!

Or maybe it’s the other way around- and this view is starting to make more sense- but whatever the case, below are some the connections we made.


The Lies!

A few minutes into the debate, Hillary Clinton warned that viewers log on to her website to verify, in real time, all the facts that either candidate puts forward throughout the 90-minute debate.

Good call Hillary! But then it turned out there was no need to log on to Hillary’s website. Some of the contradictions (read: flat lies) in Trump’s stories were too glaring.

For example, in a bid to win points over his opponent, based on the current Democratic dispensations inadequate handling of America’s wars outside, Donald told the whole world that he didn’t support America’s 2003 Invasion of Iraq. This lie was just pointless seeing as his support of the invasion has been public knowledge for a while now.

Which is exactly what informed this article. Watching Trump just reminded us of home because, guess who else can tell lies on that level of plainness? Our own politicians!

Remember 2013? When then President Goodluck Jonathan said, “now, we are generating more than 5,000MW,” only for the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) to come out days later with proof that Nigeria had never (at the time of course) generated up to that amount of electricity.

Personal advancements always trumps societal development

Much of Trumps arguments at #DebateNight revolved around the fact that he has successfully run multi-million dollar businesses. According to him, it is about time someone who knows about money ruled America.

Hillary went in on this. She scored points against Trump by playing to the emotions of the “middle-class Americans”. According to her, Trump’s tactic was to employ services of the less advantaged people and then refuse to pay them their dues. To this, he responded saying it was probably because they didn’t such a good enough job.

In response to a direct accusation by Hillary that he took advantage of existing corporate legal framework in America to cut corners with payment for services and exploit the smaller guys who rendered services for his businesses, Trump murmured: “because the laws allow”

This is exactly what our own people do. Taking advantage of every loop hole in the Constitution to their own advantage alone. On this, there’s absolutely no need to single out any instance or person. We only have cast our minds to all the people that have supported the proposition to sell off our national assets and double check against their individual and joint abilities to buy said assets.

Withholding tax returns

Dear President Buhari, …

On this one we admit that there’s a slight difference. Yet. Trump has refused to produce his tax returns and our own President has chosen not to declare his assets in contradiction of his solemn campaign promise to do so.

According to Trump, he hasn’t produced his tax returns because he is currently being audited. But the IRS already stated that it shouldn’t matter that he is being audited, Trump can still publish his tax returns.

In President Buhari’s case, as a response to mounting pressures the he and the VP should make good on their promises to declare all their assets before their hundredth day in office, the Presidency released a partial list of assets.

He then assured Nigerians that full disclosure contained in the asset documents filed with the Code of Conduct Bureau would be made public immediately after verification by the Code of Conduct Bureau.

But a statement few days after by the Code of Conduct Bureau said it had concluded the process of verifying the declarations of President.

The statement, issued in response to a news report that verification of assets and liabilities declared by Buhari, Osinbajo, President of the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, and other top government officials, including Speaker Yakubu Dogara, had not been completed, the Bureau said it had concluded the process of verifying the declarations of the mentioned officials.

Like Trump, PMB has continuously refused to publish said documents.

They always want more tax incentives

According to Trump, one of the ways he would ensure job security for Americans is by reducing the stringent tax regime in order to bring back companies he claims are fleeing America to Mexico and other places.

We are all too familiar with the call for tax holidays and regime relaxation “in order to attract foreign investors” but we all know the people who really benefit from tax holidays at the end of the day.

That bit -a concept Hillary calls “The Trump loophole”- is not lost on us. Especially the most recent one by former CBN governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi in his contribution to the subject of overcoming the recession.

So the next time you hear or see our Nigerian politicians act a certain way, blame Trump.

Or is it vice versa?

READ http://queensheir.com/blog/debatenight-donald-trump-mentor-nigerian-politicians-4-reasons/

I have always been an ardent admirer of Donald Trump, since the days of his TV show The Apprentice , I marvelled at the way he has singlehandedly built his empire, the Trump Organization. When the race for party nomination started, I actually he'd be thrown out in a matter of weeks but he has proven everyone wrong... Which is why I now believe his chances of winning the White House is much higher, since Hillary Clinton hasn't really had tough oppositions as Trump had.
To be sincere I kind of support Trump on the wages issue; if I hire you to work for me and the work is substandard, I have the right to decide not to pay you completely. And the fact that all those labourers didn't complain or make noises about it, but are only coming out now to talk to Clinton about their experience, also point to the possibility that Trump may be right.
But the issue of tax returns was just too glaring. His excuse that he was still being audited did not carry water at all. There was even a point that he said something like "probably because they wouldn't use that wisely" or so, when Clinton was claiming he didn't pay his taxes. It was obvious Clinton was right about his not paying taxes..