• Friday, March 29, 2024
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BusinessDay

Voting at elections is a sacred duty

elections

The last minute postponement of the presidential and national assembly elections slated for Feb 16, 2019 came to most Nigerians as a shock. For weeks, people, businesses and parties made arrangements, and on Friday, many people relocated, at great costs, to where they registered to ensure they performed their civic duty. But they woke up to the news of the postponement on the excuse that INEC could not master its logistics properly. This evoked memories of the recent past where elections were also postponed ostensibly due to logistic and security failure.

While the monetary, reputational and other costs are being compiled, Nigerians have a right to feel angry that an electoral umpire that had the better of four years to prepare for an election could not deliver at the appointed day. Worse is that it kept promising, assuring and reassuring everyone up until the very last day of preparations that it was fully ready and prepared to conduct the elections only for it to disappoint everyone, including international observers who arrived in anticipation of the polls and now have to extend their stay in the country by an additional week due to no fault of theirs.

While the anger is understandable, it must not dampen our morale or stop us from going on to vote in our next set of leaders. Election is an important and sacred duty thrust on citizens by the democratic system of government on the premise that over their affairs, the citizens should be sovereign. Nigerians must always strive to discharge this sacred duty no matter the obstacles placed on our way or the disappointments we encounter along the way.

We must discharge this duty with the utmost care and resolve that it should always be clear to those who prefer other systems of government that democracy remains the best system of government invented by man for the organisation of society. We owe it to ourselves and our children to bequeath a better society and country – and the very least we can do to achieve this is to ensure we vote for the right set of leaders at all elections – leaders that will truly represent us and that will be always accountable to us.

Democracy thrives when leaders know that citizens are politically active and aware and will hold them to account at every electoral circle.

This particular election provides Nigerians with another opportunity to further deepen Nigeria’s democratic culture. It is a testament to our resilience as a people that despite all the odds, we have achieved 20 years on the journey towards democratic consolidation. The hiccups must not dampen our spirit. We have the power to vote for leaders and representatives that will reform our country and build lasting institutions that will be a permanent bulwark against such systematic failures as we witnessed last week.

Despite the anger we feel towards the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), we must support it to deliver a credible election. It must show that it is truly independent and impartial, not only in name, but in deed. It must ensure that this time, there is no margin for errors and to compensate Nigerians, it must deliver a near flawless elections that would be adjudged free, fair, transparent and credible by all citizens and our international partners.
Political parties and politicians, on their part, must learn to internalise the rules of the game and accept outcomes of credible elections.

We wish Nigerians a happy and peaceful elections!!!