THAT DEMOCRACY MAY HAVE MEANING
“With politics now the exclusive province of a tiny elite group for whom party platforms are mere vehicles, not necessarily to advance any ideal but rather to secure power and privileges, we must understand that the interest of the ordinary citizens is not factored into the convulsions going on within both the APC and the PDP. Yet, if power, as we glibly say, emanates from, and belongs to, the people, then there is an urgent need to reform our political system to reflect that reality and restore the confidence of the people in democracy”
Idecided to capture the last part of Olusegun Adeniyi’s recent column, “Stones in their rice, sands in their garri” and use it to start my intervention. What caught me is “there is an urgent need to reform our political system...”
Certainly, there is the need to reform our political system but one of the most important questions to answer is where do we start from. A population of 180 million need representatives they can trust to stand in for them on all issues of importance or relevance to their wellbeing and my thinking is that this is where we have got it wrong all along.
If we cannot vouch for those who represent us then it is as good as saying that there is no representation at all. This is the reality of Nigeria today so much so that to see an elected leader working for the people is a rarity and an exception to the rule.
The biggest problem with our politics today is our selection process. It is tainted and skewed in favour of election generals and godfathers and this is the reason why when you hear about a political party planning to take power, it talks not about the people but about the generals it expects to join its fold.
The people are not considered at all but all the consideration is for the election generals who can pull out the votes in their areas and spheres of control. So in reality what we practise in Nigeria and call democracy is actually, “a government of the election generals by the generals and for the generals”.
For the people to take hold of their destiny our political selection process must change and this change must take place before any meaningful political reform can take root. If there are elections to a national conference or a referendum or plebiscite takes place in Nigeria today, one thing is certain: with the selection process that we have in place the outcomes can and would always be manipulated.
For our democracy to be deemed the government of the people by the people for the people where the sovereignty of the people is exercised through their elected representatives and leaders, then we must ensure that every vote counts and is accounted for. There should be no doubt or question to the fact that any time there is a voting process in Nigeria, that the minority will have their say while the majority will have their way.
How do we ensure that this happens? By ensuring that every vote counts. How do we ensure that every vote counts? Only by insisting that all the votes cast are accounted for. How do we ever hope to hold our “elected” representatives accountable if our votes are not accounted for in the first place? Remember that if your vote is not counted and accounted for, you cannot be taken seriously by any of “our” representatives as they know that in reality your vote did not get them there. Instead they would be loyal and listen to the godfathers and election generals who “democratically” allocated them the positions.
All those crying and seeking to change the present circumstances of our country either through the enthronement of capable rulers, restructuring, national conferences or referendums, without first tackling the problem of how to creditably select those who will represent us are just groping in the dark.
Reading the reports of past elections from 1999-2015 as published by credible election observers like the International Republican Institute and the National Democratic Institute, what we have considered as elections all along will only pass as mere events to allocate votes. In areas where actual voting took place, results collation and compilation turned democracy on its head while elections did not hold at all in many places.
What we have had since the beginning of our democratic journey is simply “vote allocation” by election generals in their sectors and areas of control. Little wonder why political parties in Nigeria do not canvass for voters to lean towards them but instead negotiate with election generals to move to their platforms. Today, the reality is that the votes of the populace do not count but only the choices of election generals do.
Can we the people ever take back our country if we cannot be in charge of our votes? The answer is never.
But how can we begin to take back our votes and get our country back? By demanding a system where our votes are counted, collated and archived as we cast them. By rejecting a system where after standing for hours to cast our votes at polling points, the votes are discarded and discounted at collation centres in preference for the allocation of votes by election generals.
We must demand a voting system that is real-time, online and free of manipulation. We must demand and secure the introduction of total electronic voting in Nigeria as the minimum irreducible and start point for any credible political reform process.
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