The headquarters smells of fresh paint and ambition, which Nadia Osei has learned to treat as the same thing. She stands at the window with a glass of water she has not drunk, watching Kofi Asante work the room. He is good at this. She will give him that. He moves between the volunteers like a man who has never forgotten a name in his life, and Nadia knows for a fact that he forgets names constantly. She keeps a running list on her phone. She texts him before every event.

"Nadia." He appears at her elbow. He has the gift of materialising. "You're not working the room."

"I'm watching you work it," she says. "There's a difference."

He smiles. The smile is real. That is both his strength and the thing that worries her most. A man with a real smile believes his own performance, and a man who believes his own performance will eventually be surprised when reality declines to perform back.

"Emeka Dawa has twelve years," she says. "Bello Musa has the voter rolls, three television stations, and Governor Nkosi's personal number. What do we have?"

Kofi looks at the room. Twenty-three volunteers. A whiteboard. A stack of T-shirts with his face on them that Nadia has already decided are a mistake.

"We have the people," he says.

Nadia sets down her water. "The people," she says, "voted for Dawa twice."