The conduct of last Saturday’s gubernatorial elections in Kogi and Bayelsa States again brings to the fore the urgent need to overhaul Nigeria’s electoral system.
It underscores the urgent need for electronic voting and for President Muhammadu Buhari to immediately sign the Electoral (Amendment) Bill.
Both gubernatorial elections were won by the candidates of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
However, reports from major local and international observers who monitored the elections show the level of violence by supporters of Nigeria’s two leading political parties, the APC and the People’s Democratic Party, has put a dent on the credibility of the polls.
YIAGA Africa and the Situation Room alleged that the elections were marred by vote-buying, ballot box snatching and intimidation of voters and specifically called for the outright cancellation of the governorship and senatorial elections in Kogi State. The observers said the election was not a reflection of the wishes of the people.
The main opposition PDP also rejected the outcome of the elections, saying that security agencies colluded with the ruling party to rig the election in their favour.
Elections in Nigeria have become increasingly prone to violence. A final report on the 2019 general elections by the European Union Election Observation Mission had said the elections were marred by violence and intimidation with the role of security agencies becoming more contentious as the process progressed.
Pundits say the situation may not change in the next few years if urgent steps are not taken to reform the nation’s electoral system, punish political offenders and remove the control of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) from the executive arm of government.
“Personally, I think we are just deceiving ourselves,” Ayo Adebanjo, elder statesman and leader of Afenifere, a pan-Yoruba group, said.
“I have said it several times that we are not serious about conducting elections in this country. This is not an election. We have to change the present constitution and remove INEC from the control of the executive,” he said.
Sanni Yabagi, presidential candidate of Action Democratic Party (ADP) in the 2019 Nigeria elections, said lack of punitive law and the inability of INEC and security agencies to punish electoral offenders play a key part in the increasing violence and ballot-box snatching noticed in recent elections in the country.
“The way forward is for Buhari to sign the electoral bill into law which would give way to electronic transmission of result. It would eliminate tampering of result. Also, the Electronic Offences Tribunal Bill should be passed into law by the National Assembly,” Yabagi said.
At least four people were killed by political thugs in Kogi, including a nephew to Dino Melaye, a senator. Reports said five people were mowed down by thugs in Bayelsa State.
Yabagi advocated for the scrapping of off-season election, saying that it was a part of the problem.
“The off-season election should be scrapped. We need to amend the constitution for that. Let the governors take the remaining period when they win at the tribunal or court, rather than bothering the voters again and giving way for all these crises,” he said.
Recently, former President Goodluck Jonathan said the only way to salvage the nation’s democracy was for the National Assembly to the review existing law for the country to compulsorily embrace electronic voting.
“We must come up with new standards for constituting our election management body in a way that people will have confidence. I believe in some quarters what they do is that a body of people constitute the Election Management Body. It is not in the hands of one person,” he said.
Balarabe Musa, Second Republic governor of Kaduna State, said the country must take punitive measures to check the increasing trend of electoral violence to save the nation’s democracy.
“We have to punish anybody who is seen to be instigating violence and stop them from contesting it; because we are tolerating them, that is why all this is happening. If we are serious about free and fair elections in Nigeria it must be checked. Look at what happened in Kogi and Bayelsa; it is a shame to this country,” he said.
The case of Bayelsa is a big lesson for politicians. Politicians say Seriake Dickson, state governor, made a lot of enemies after the PDP primary election.
According to PDP stalwarts in Bayelsa, Jonathan wanted Timi Alaibe, a technocrat and former managing director of the Niger Delta Development Commission, to fly the flag of the party. But Dickson wanted Duoye Diri, whom he can control. Politicians in Bayelsa said Dickson’s disposition hurt a number of Goodluck Jonathan’s allies who decided to shock him for disparaging the former president and ignoring the feelings of party members.
One of the politicians said the Bayelsa governor wanted to become the sole standard bearer of the party for senatorial candidate if Diri had won.
“He wanted to behave like Rochas Okorocha, who wanted to impose his in-law on the party and Imo State while becoming a senator,” one politician said.
Though Jonathan did not openly campaign for David Lyon, his body language sent his Ogbia and other local government areas the message about Dickson and his candidate. On November 6, Eunice Jonathan, the former president’s mother, hosted Lyon and granted her blessings to the APC candidate.
Lyon was led by Ogbia leaders and Jonathan’s kinsmen, including Robert Enogha, a grassroots mobiliser and former chairman of Bayelsa Environmental Sanitation Agency, who had left Dickson’s government to join the APC. But this was not enough warning for the Bayelsa governor. The defection of Enogha, and that of Claudius Enegesi, a political associate of Jonathan and speaker in the old Rivers State when Ada George was the governor, meant little to PDP.
In Brass Local Government Area, Beimo Spiff, coordinator of the PDP governorship campaign council in the area, defected to the APC. Later on, Ebebi Peremobowe, former deputy governor of Bayelsa State and prominent member of the PDP, left the party.
Benjamin Ogbara, director, Ethics and Compliance, Due Process Bureau, and Natus Zebakame, Dickson’s special adviser on culture, left the party as well.
There were also other high-profile defections. Godspower Ake, special adviser on agriculture; Berry Negerese, serving commissioner 1 in the Bayelsa State Local Government Service Commission; Iniruo Ipogi, special assistant on students’ affairs; and Clever Ebede, special adviser on ICT development, also left.
ODINAKA ANUDU & INIOBONG IWOK
