By Eben Enasco
In October 1979, after more than 13 years of military rule, Nigeria returned to democratic rule still struggling to find a rhythm.
The belief to move away from an autocratic stronghold left many determined Nigerians to fight to achieve the dream.
The National Party of Nigeria emerged victorious in the presidential election that kick-started the democratic voyage and the late Alhaji Shehu Shagari became the first democratically elected president.
This commitment to democracy remains widespread among Countrymen despite frustrations with the government over flawed 2003, 2007, and partially successful.
Nigeria has a democratic constitution with a federal system modeled after the US.
The executive is headed by the president and carries out the laws, and the Legislature, led by Senate President and Speaker make the laws, (National Assembly), comprised of the House of Representatives and Senate. The Judiciary is headed by the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), who oversees the arm of government that interprets the laws.
Also, in the Nigerian context, democracy in the acclaimed Federalism is something much talked about as a set objective pursued with apparent vigor but not yet attained.
For almost half a century, Nigerians have been searching for democracy through constitutional reforms and intricate political engineering and experimentation, spelled out in successive transition programs.
They have, however, been continuously disappointed.
According to Former INEC chairman, Prof Attahiru Jega, in one of his pieces, Key among the divergent issues in Nigeria’s Political frailty is the notch for deep political culture.
The impact of these divergent political cultures may have an important bearing on the conceptions of democracy.
Diverse groups and individuals participating in the political, and democratic processes must necessarily have different conceptions of democracy.
We may perhaps begin to understand and explain the failure to bring about democracy in Nigeria by examining how Nigerians have conceived of, or perceived democracy from the perspective of the crisis of political culture.
It has been argued with some justification that for the ongoing democratization process to be meaningful to the people, and to be able to provide for their social and economic rights and basic needs, it must essentially ‘draw on African traditions to adapt democracy to the cultural and historical experience of ordinary people.
Disagreements within the political culture on the appropriate concepts of democracy for Nigeria are not, however, the sole explanation for the failure of democratic rule.
A fundamental explanation lies in the contradictions embedded in the processes of accumulation in the post-colonial political economy, characterized as it is by a military-controlled state and a rentier economy.
Many Third World countries in the 1990s have been concerned with democratic consolidation, whereas the primary concern for Nigeria was, and still is, how to end military rule and bring about credible democratic rule.
Analysts have proffered many reasons for the persistence of political crises in Nigeria.
Notable among these is the concentration of power in the central government due to prolonged military rule; the erosion of the rule of law, and the independence of the judiciary or, at least, it being cowed into submission by military rulers.
Others include the absence of structures and institutions that can redress the mutual fears and suspicions of Nigeria’s diverse ethnic groups, reckless misrule by a corrupt and morally bankrupt political ruling class.
Fascinating theoretical discourses have equally been put forward, attributing the Nigerian socio-
economic and political democratic crisis to predation, patrimonialism, the ‘rogue’ state, the dynamics of global capitalist expansion, and class formation in the periphery.
Our understanding of the Nigerian situation has certainly improved from the prolific output of dedicated scholars, but the burning issue of democracy has remained as confounding as ever.
February 25, 2023, is another day set aside to make corrections through the votes cast.
The electoral umpire in the past years has continued to improve to bridge the loopholes by trying hard to make the votes of the electorate count.
According to the statistics given by the electoral umpire, INEC, about 87, 209,007 Nigerians who collected their Permanent Voters Cards PVC out of the 93,469,008 registered voters in the country are qualified and expected to vote during the current election cycle.
This, it said, represents about 93.3 percent of the total registered voters in the country as about 6.2 million registered voters failed to collect their PVCs at the close of collection on February 5.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC chairman, Prof Mahmood Yakubu who presented the figures at a media briefing ahead of the elections said about 13.6 million new PVCs were printed for those who registered newly or applied to transfer their voter’s card for the replacement.
The statistics further revealed that Lagos leads the pack of states with about 6,214,970 PVCs collected.
This is closely followed by Kano with 5,594,193, Kaduna with 4,164,473; Katsina with 3,459,945; Rivers with 3,285,785, and Oyo with 2,761,421. Ekiti State with 958,052 has the smallest number of PVCs collected and also has the smallest number of registered voters.
Bauchi State with a registered voter population of 2,749268 is however leading other states in terms of PVC collection with 99 percent of the voter’s card collected in the state, followed by Anambra with 98.8 percent, and Katsina with 98.4 percent.
Prof. Yakubu said even though the rate of PVC collection remains high, a large number of cards were still not collected by Nigerians.
He described the INEC register of voters as the largest and most secure database in the country and on the African continent and one of the largest in the world with over 93.7 million registered voters.
He said the commission has succeeded in removing many persons from the registered for one reason or the other and will continue to do so with the help of the citizens while asking Nigerians to continue to guide the document as a national treasure.
Prof Yakubu said the commission was fully ready for the conduct of the forthcoming election, as it has completed arrangements with transport unions for the movement of men and materials to polling units on Saturday.
The close contest for the presidency has always been between two political rivalries.
But for the 2023 elections, not the usual PDP and APC, the margins have been widened to four Parties, which has created room for choices.
Another area that gives hope to the voters is the introduction of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, BVAS.
Information Technology experts say that to prevent the BVAS from malfunctioning, it required regular software updates and serviceable broadband access, requiring 4G technology for convenient download.
Besides, poor quality internet access is a major challenge in the use of the new electoral technologies as several areas especially remote locations within the country don’t have 4G network coverage and this may be a strong concern for the identification of eligible voters.
However, apart from the network concerns for BVAS, one of the greatest threats to democracy, is votes buying and Prof Yakubu was heard saying the Commission was working with security agencies to either reduce the incidence or eradicate it.
INEC faces huge electoral challenges, the new technologies being only one of them.
Resident Electoral Commissioners RECs are the most powerful and influential in elections.
The RECs are the representatives of INEC at the state level.
The role of RECs is crucial for the accomplishment of any election.
The duties of the RECs include monitoring the activities of all INEC ad-hoc staff/RECs as well as providing for proper verification of election results.
INEC relies heavily on REC’s verifications in authenticating the election results on the presupposition that RECs are people of unquestionable integrity.
The integrity of INEC’s RECs will therefore play a significant role in assessing the value of the 2023 general elections.
It is expected that the commission would have re-educated its staff and RECs given several months allotted to the commission to prepare to toe the path of honor and integrity in the conduct of the 2023 elections.
Given the narratives of the INEC chairman, the police authority, and all other relevant stakeholders’ assurances, hopes are high that a free and Credible election will put an end to a long search for the rightness of many setbacks in Nigeria’s democratic ordinance.
