The 2019 presidential and National Assembly elections will take place on 16th February, while the governorship and state assembly/Federal Capital Territory (FCT) council elections have been scheduled for 2nd March.
Like in 2015, there is so much apprehension as many do not believe that the elections, especially the presidential leg of it, will be thoroughly free and fair.
This is understandable, given that the sitting President Muhammadu Buhari is an interested party, being the candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC). Buhari is campaigning on the platform of sustainability and taking Nigeria to the next level.
But his main challenger Atiku Abubakar of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) says he wants to get Nigeria working again.
Obiageli Ezekwesili, former World Bank vice president and human rights crusader, anchors her manifesto on ‘hope’.
Omoyele Sowore of the African Action Congress wants to take back Nigeria from the people he mostly describes as ‘old and analogue politicians’.
Kingsley Moghalu, former deputy governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria and candidate of Young Progressive Party, believes that Nigeria needs a new vision, worldview and leader with 21st century knowledge-base.
Fela Durotoye of Alliance for New Nigeria (ANN) is targeting a new Nigeria if elected president.
All other candidates have different visions and manifestoes that reflect their worldviews, experiences and missions.
But beyond manifestoes and visions, all eyes are on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to deliver free, fair and acceptable elections that will pass local and international observers’ tests. The reasons are very clear.
“Being an election year, performance of the economy in 2019 would to a large extent depend on the transparency and credibility of the election,” the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN) says.
Ben Afudego, partner and advisory leader for West Africa, Ernst& Young (EY), told BusinessDay that credible elections are necessary in 2019 in order not to erode the confidence of investors.
“Let us not create uncertainty in the system. We need to pay enough attention to governance in Nigeria and rest of Africa,” he added.
The INEC, on its part, has assured Nigerians that the elections would be free, fair and transparent.
At his keynote address at the 6th Convocation Lecture of Oduduwa University (OUI) in Ipetumodu in November 2018, Mahmood Yakubu, INEC chairman, said the commission would conduct free, fair, and credible general elections in 2019.
“As we are approaching the general elections, the commission is more than prepared to conduct election that will be acceptable to all and sundry and the international community.
“In all fairness, the commission has drastically leapt up from where it was when democratic was resurrected in 1999,” he said.
But sceptics believe that INEC’s conduct of Ekiti and Osun elections left much to be desired, claiming that the body was partisan and oversaw massive rigging in these elections.
Even the opposition PDP recently argued that INEC is partisan and is under pressure to do the bidding of the ruling APC in the coming elections.
But a spokesman of the electoral body had reacted to partisan allegations of PDP in September, dismissing that as balderdash.
Political watchers believe there are many reasons why the elections at all levels should never be compromised.
First is the fact that Nigeria’s unity is currently fragile. The country is completely divided on ethnic and religious lines. This is because many parts of the country believe that the present government is pro-Hausa/Fulani in its appointments and body language. Others worry that almost all security agencies are headed by Muslims in a country where the population of Christians and Muslims are theoretically equal. This has increased the level of agitations and reservations in many parts of the country.
Also, the issue of Fulani herdsmen has not been handled properly, says Atuma Ngere, a political analyst and lawyer.
“The President’s excuse that the farmers-herdsmen clashes had lasted for centuries before his coming makes no sense. The Biafra issue caused Nigeria civil war, yet the President rushed to quell the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) agitations and even classified them as a terrorist group when they began,” he said.
“But for him, Fulani herdsmen, who are killing people every day, is not a terrorist group and do not need force. Why has nobody been arrested and prosecuted since January 2018 when the Benue State government lamented that the federal government security officials abandoned him when he called them for protection?” he asked.
While APC is gaining traction in South-South and South-East, the peoples of the region still nurse the belief that the current government is pro-north. This is palpable in South-East where there are still reservations about Buhari.
Many parts of the North, especially Kaduna, are still deeply divided and may be volatile should there be any suspicion of election rigging.
The opposition party currently feels that Buhari’s refusal to sign the Electoral Act into law means he wants to sidestep the use of card readers. This concern is important given the volatile nature of the polity at the moment.
All stakeholders in the forthcoming elections must learn lessons from other countries.
Part of the reasons why the English-speaking Southern Cameroon is boiling today is that they believe that seven different elections that kept bringing President Paul Biya back to power side-lined them.
Biya won a seventh term in office in polls marred by low turnout and voter intimidation in October 2018.
The 85-year-old Biya had 71.3 percent of the votes, according to official results.
Before the election result, Biya had deployed riot police to the major cities of Yaoundé and Douala in case of opposition protested.
Across the country, only half of Cameroon’s voting-age population took part in the polls, BBC reportred, while tens of thousands of people were unable to cast their votes.
Two days before results were announced, Africa’s longest-serving President Teodoro Obiang Nguema of neighbouring Equatorial Guinea had congratulated Biya on his win, BBC said.
Today, Southern Cameroon is burning, with scores of people who feel disenchanted killed.
Poorly-conducted elections have led to wars in Cote D’Ivoire, Sierra Leone and Liberia.
“Elections are about sentiments and no one should tamper with such,” Chukwudi Ikedife, a Nigerian civil society activist, said.
Political historians believe that one of the remote causes of January 15 1966 military coup d’état was the 1964 election crisis.
Also, the 1983 elections were marred with irregularities and rigging, resulting in military coup d’état that brought the then Major Buhari to power, thereby ending Nigeria’s Second Republic.
It is also important to note that Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida’s refusal to recognise Moshood Abiola as the winner of 1993 presidential election eventually brought in one of Africa’s worst dictators Sani Abacha.
Nigeria also does not need partisan security agencies. Many citizens are sceptical about the Operation Python Dance which will take place in all the states during elections. They do not trust the military and the police, which, according to them, showed partisanship in Ekiti and Osun elections.
Political observers warn that all stakeholders—INEC, political parties, security agencies, civil societies, human right activists, election observers and the media—must maintain decorum as next month’s election can make or mar the country.
They ask INEC and security agencies to place Nigeria on the front burner before any political party.
ODINAKA ANUDU
