Nigeria And Elections Miscellany (I)
As a country, we had our first General Elections on September 20, 1923 and ever since electoral disputes and disputations have not eluded us. Indeed, since Independence on October 1, 1960 no election was held without controversy or acrimony! Let us use the 2019 General Elections as a case study.
The campaign and elections had never been so acrimonious, divisive, devastating and bloodletting (save what the nation experienced in the twilight of the First Republic). The outcome of the Presidential Election Tribunal affirming the declaration of Muhammadu Buhari as the lawfully elected president has led this columnist on this voyage of elections’ miscellany, especially now that the judiciary is now the weeping boy of some, if not most members of the political class. They hardly trust the judiciary! Let us begin this intercourse by highlighting some of the issues that dominated the campaign and general elections:
The bane of the nation is the prominence given to ethnic issues. The 2019 General Elections were largely dominated by ethnicity to the extent some ethnic groups were harassed, violated harangued and threatened for daring to hold political opinions different from those of their hosts. Politicians also appealed to base ethnic sentiments as a carry-over of what the nation experienced in the First Republic that eventually led to thirteen years’ of military interregnum.
Personal and personality attacks dominated the political landscape rather than socio-political, economic, technological and restructuring or no restructuring issues being brought to the fore for the electorates to decipher.
The common definition of hate speech is ‘an abusive or threatening speech or writing that expresses prejudice against a person or a particular group.’ All we were treated to were hate speeches that should not be heard or listened to in any sane clime. We were treated to issues of cloning, double body, fugitives, death, ill-health, etc. Can we really make any progress with this approach to electioneering?
As we do know, fake news is junk news or pseudo-news akin to yellow journalism or propaganda consisting of deliberate disinformation or hoaxes spread to audiences to disparage, destroy or destabilise the victims.
One of the greatest issues that has confronted our current democratic experiment is insecurity of lives and property including insurgency, boko haram, herdsmen crises, restiveness in the Niger Delta, kidnapping, assassination, arson, vandalisation of public facilities and economic structures. Unfortunately, twenty years on, the country is still battling with these vices. Yet, not much was done by the political class to address them during the campaign.
We cannot forget the country currently has over 93 motley political parties, no thanks to fraudulent politicians who felt they should have standby political parties in their ‘pockets’ in the event of the need to switch political loyalty or when there are irreconcilable differences. This issue played out amongst many of the political parties especially within the two dominant political parties. Political conflict resolution mechanisms suffered and the political landscape became an arena for the smartest and political prostitutes.
Some of our religious leaders abandoned their spiritual calling and descended into the arena of politics. We saw unholy revelations and satanic predictions. Religious war brewed in the air!
Most of us, if not all of us knew about financial inducement. Nigerian politics is highly monetised. No thanks to the monumental attractions inherent in the political system. The easiest way to amass wealth in Nigeria is seen as the political route. Therefore, we saw our politicians inducing electorates with everything imaginable including cash, empty promises and illogical things. The gravity had to do with the financial muscle of the affected political parties.
Most pundits had thought we should by now be bidding bye-bye to political thuggery and violence. Alas, the 2019 General Elections became one of the worst moments in the annals of political violence and thuggery in Nigeria. Thugs had a field period maiming, killing, snatching ballot boxes, snuffing ballot boxes and even the audacity and effrontery to challenge and rubbish security agents.
Unlike in the First Republic, the current political system lacks ideology. All we see now is the meeting of strange bed fellows. Our politicians talked of ‘interest’ as if it was a commodity. It is now difficult to decipher what a particular political party stands for if it is not a motley crowd.
As explained by Forbes, media manipulation shaped most things we read, heard and watched. According to Wikipedia, ‘media manipulation is a series of related techniques in which partisans create an image or argument that favours their particular interest.’ It is on record that some media owners and executives were on the payroll of some units of the political class. Whereas, one of the elementary discourse in journalism is ‘he who pays the piper, dictates the tune’. How does the media hold the government accountable to the people if it allows itself to be manipulated by self-seeking and self-serving politicians?
Generally, we are having more of voters’ apathy, lethargy and indolence. As cosmopolitan as Lagos is, it could not record 25% voters’ turnout! Kano and many other States fell into the same abyss. The monumental voters’ apathy has led to analysts asking if the 90 million registered voters were real, imaginary or doctored.
TO BE CONTINUED AND CONCLUDED NEXT WEEK.
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