Preparations for the 2019 general election got legislative traction when the Senate amended the Electoral Act 2010, legalising electronic voting, recently. All election results will now be transmitted electronically from polling centres in an encrypted and secure form to where they would be statutorily posted. This is a welcome development. It is argued that a country cannot be truly democratic until its citizens have the opportunity to choose their representatives through elections that are free and fair.
The Independent National Electoral Commission had asked the political parties, security agencies, candidates and all stakeholders to take note of February 16, 2019 as the date for presidential and National Assembly elections; and March 2, for governorship and state assembly elections, when it earlier released a timetable.
Under the chairmanship of Attahiru Jega, the commission introduced the card reader electronic device and Permanent Voter Card in the 2015 elections, which improved the integrity of the country’s electoral process. But some political parties, candidates and the courts questioned the legality of the card reader. The Supreme Court, in dismissing it when it decided an election appeal before it, said the device was never “intended to supplant, displace, or supersede” the voter register.
The judgement was at odds with Nigeria’s challenges of conducting free and fair elections. The voter register has always been corrupted by dubious politicians through multiple registrations of voters with intent to cheat during polls. Against this background, INEC provided the card reader in the Approved Guidelines and Regulations for the conduct of the 2015 polls. But, putting it beyond the realm of legal exploitation, Section 52 (2) of the Electoral Act reads, “This amendment mandates e-voting without ambiguity but also gives the commission the direction to use other methods if it is impracticable to use e-voting in any election.”This is a good idea.
The early release of the timetable, according to INEC, is an attempt to standardise the electoral process and ensure certainty, in line with the practice in other advanced democracies. We couldn’t agree more; the United States, Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, Costa Rica, Mexico and Ghana are among countries with immutable electoral timetables. Nigeria was cast into anxiety and suspicion when the Presidency, working in alliance with the military, arm-twisted Jega to shift the election schedule in 2015, citing insecurity in the North-East. It is gratifying that such recrudescence has been banished with INEC’s action.
Indeed, the INEC whistle imposes huge responsibility on the parties, some of which have become fractious, to sink their differences and plan; even more on filthy umpire itself. Two years after the 2015 polls, the commission is yet to fully purge its system of bribe-takers. For benefiting from the N23 billion the last administration allegedly used to manipulate the elections, INEC recently suspended 202 of its personnel and placed them on half salary, pending the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission’s conclusion of their trial. We ought to have gone beyond this level by now.
For too long, our elections have been defined by Gaza Strip mentality. From electioneering to Election Day, killing and maiming of political opponents and stuffing and snatching of ballot boxes have invariably thrown up those who usurp the mandate of the people. The late Umaru Yar’Adua, whose election as president in 2007 was adjudged globally as the most flawed by international election observers, was so challenged by that infamy that he constituted the Muhammadu Uwais-led panel to reform our electoral process.
Its breath-taking report included, but not limited to, the setting up of a commission for trying electoral offenders and clearing all election petitions at Election Tribunals before winners could be sworn in. Muhammadu Buhari’s administration ought to have dusted off the report, instead of the rigmarole the country is presently experiencing in the Ken Nnamani-chaired committee on another electoral reform.
Official lethargy should give way to seriousness in the enforcement of the country’s electoral writ. Lack of it explains why the subversion of our electoral process has become a growing criminal vocation. It has entrenched corruption in the judiciary. As laudable as the conduct of 2015 elections was, the European Union Observer Team said that 30 deaths occurred. The governorship election rerun in Bayelsa State in January 2016, in just one local government area, also claimed 14 lives. This macabre trend has to be halted.
As violence is a nightmare, so are INEC’s logistics inadequacies. The non-arrival of a substantial number of ballot-papers for the 2007 elections from South Africa headlined its shoddy preparations. Equally embarrassing are the perennial shortage of electoral materials and National Union of Road Transport Workers’ last minute negation of its deal with INEC to transport materials to polling centres. More rigour in planning could stem these howlers in 2019.
Sadly, such devotion has not been applied to the continuous voter registration, which it is about to start now. INEC Chairman, Mahmood Yakubu, says 7.8 million PVCs from the last elections are yet to be distributed to their owners across the states. Perhaps, things might have been different if the President had been sagacious and time conscious in appointing State Resident Electoral Commissioners in the 27 states that vacancies exist, to speed up operations. Therefore, the Senate should stop being blinded by selfish pursuits and irrationality and screen the nominees before it for the jobs now.
It is regrettable that halfway through the second decade of the 21st century, the mechanics of our voting process remain largely rooted in the past. All over the world, governments are increasingly deploying election technology to secure public trust. It is argued that technology can play a critical role in creating a more transparent, inclusive electoral process. We need not remind INEC that more technical efficiency is even required in the use of the card reader machines, given the hiccups experienced in 2015. INEC should wisely implement new tools to change the inner workings of our electoral process.
