By Tonnie Iredia
In many societies across the globe, there is a high degree of consensus that democracy is the best example of a government of the people especially because persons in government are supposedly elected by the people to represent them. But how are we sure that those in government were the ones the people actually elected?
The only way to determine that is to critically examine the processes and procedures of regular general elections in a given society. But then, even in a free and fair contest, it is essentially simplistic to regard those who constitute government in countries such as Nigeria as bonafide representatives of the people considering the trend of an insignificant minority of the population who serve as electors. During the last general elections in Nigeria in 2023, about 93 million citizens were registered to vote, but only 25 million showed up to cast their ballots.
The low turn-out which the 2023 exercise exemplifies was neither an isolated case nor has there been any sign of improvement in the horizon. Only a week ago, an off-cycle governorship election in one of the states- Anambra, Southeast of the country, produced a more concerning outcome.
Although the election recorded a better turn-out figure than the one before it in 2021, the latest outcome is still too low to be used as a credible barometer to suggest that the winner was the choice of the majority. This is because of the about 2.8 million registered voters in the state, less than 600,000 turned out to vote – a figure representing 21.4 per cent participation. Why are Nigerians refusing to claim ownership of their own democracy? This question which analysts have been asking in the last two decades seems to always get the same incredible recommendation each time it is asked.
Interestingly, it would appear that many interest
groups believe the suggestion that what is required is a greater
intensification of public enlightenment schemes to sensitize citizens on the
benefits of participating in their nation’s election process. But why would the
people who were either originally convinced on their own or perhaps persuaded
by others on the importance of registering to vote require to once again be
persuaded to now vote during elections?
It would have been a different matter if the goal was to increase the number of persons who cast their ballots on voting day. What a registered voter should be persuaded about is not the importance of participating in election but the need to choose a particular candidate/party among the contestants. In Nigeria, there is need to undertake research on why registered voters usually shun voting and indeed why such a behaviour has taken a firm root across the nation.
If the poser is critically examined, it may not be too difficult to come to the inevitable conclusion that the problem has persisted largely because Nigeria has never had an accurate register of voters. Why for instance should the numerical strength of our register continue to be put at 93 million when we have always known that a chunk of the figure never collected their permanent voters’ cards (PVCs)?
The 2023 presidential election alone showed that as many as 10 million PVCs were never collected. If the base of our calculation remains a figure which includes inchoate registration, we can’t arrive at the correct turn-out rate. It is also simplistic to imagine that it is only those who could not collect their cards that did not vote. Many people with PVCs just didn’t vote on account of numerous reasons.
While some people shun voting because of electoral violence, there are many votes that are strategically suppressed. Perhaps not many people are fully aware of the rationale for the purchase of PVCs. What usually happens is that just before elections, some political parties move about to purchase PVCs from specific locations. By buying off such cards from their lawful owners, votes in such areas which are usually the areas of strength of opponents are drastically reduced.
With the fear of improved technology, those who bought the cards dare not use them, all that they now achieve is that they stop their opponents from garnering huge votes from their traditional areas of strength. A major implication of this strategy is that it reduces voter turn-out which analysts always wrongly ascribe to lack of interest in participation and for which more suggestions are made for further efforts to be put into awareness campaigns.
When uncollected PVCs are added to those that were sold in addition to those who shunned voting for other reasons, the figure that is arrived at would lack accuracy. Reliance on such inaccurate data naturally encourages several negative postures to our electoral process. One of such postures is the way different interest groups parade conflicting versions of our voting population.
A good example is the number of persons regarded as voters in Nigeria by politicians which never tallies with the figure presented by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). After a review of its registration exercise for the 2019 general elections, INEC arrived at a figure of 84 million voters. In other words, she could neither have printed more or less than 84million ballot papers nor could she have divided the nation into electoral units whose total could rake in more than 84million votes.
On their part, our two major political parties had a different plan. The APC alone was working to score 60 million votes from its women and youth segments and an additional 40 million votes from its Buhari/Osinbajo Dynamic Support group.
The Fulani Youths Association of Nigeria was organized to bring 11 million votes. Other APC groups combined, too numerous to list here, were to rake in another figure of 29 million votes. Put differently, although INEC produced 84 million ballot papers for the elections, the ruling APC was planning to consume about 140 million ballots! By its own calculation, the main opposition PDP expected no less than 97 million votes. With this type of mindset of our major politicians, it is practically impossible for Nigeria to attain a rational turn-out figure at any election.
This is one of the reasons why the unending belief that political awareness to get more people to vote so as to enhance our turn-out amounts to pursuing shadows. We need to first conduct elections properly in line with best practices before we can begin to expect that the outcomes of elections in our clime such as voter turn-out can make some sense.
Instead of dealing with substantive challenges such as electoral violence, the long distances between voters and their voting centres as well as the partisanship of electoral officials, so much time and resources are wasted on voter education that is dedicated towards encouraging those shunning elections to have a change of heart. It is as if the average Nigerian cannot see for himself the dangers inherent in participating in elections in the country.
One of the greatest causes of poor voter turn-out is huge cynicism and mistrust of the election system. Ample evidence exists to show that there is too much of manipulation in the country’s electoral system. At the apex of the electoral umpire, it is easy to see the failure to be impartial. In 2023, election result sheets were quite rough through multiple alteration of scores already recorded. The rules of the game were altered midway leaving many citizens frustrated. While Nigeria is yet to determine how many of its citizens now shun election as a result of the poor performance of INEC, the judiciary which should have remained the last hope of the common man was also unfortunately manipulated into protecting the umpire. This has greatly done far more harm to our elections than the so-called unwillingness of voters to continue to be active participants in our electoral process.
Related to the issue of manipulation is a new sore point of governors who are defecting from one party to another. The major issue in this new point is the image created that the mandate of the voter is not sacred. It is no doubt demoralizing to see a governor defecting to a party which the voters rejected during the 2023 elections.
Some of the defectors claim that they arrived at their decisions after allegedly consulting widely – a supposed wide consultation that did not involve the voter. Even if some of the people consulted were voters, there is no legal basis for anyone to change the choice of voters without another election. The fact that our governors do not bother to wait for another election cycle before abandoning the electorate establishes beyond reasonable doubt that our election system has become redundant. Why vote again?
*Dr. Iredia, former DG of the NTA, is a commentator on public issues
No comments:
Post a Comment