March 10, 2010
2011 Elections and the Road to Nowhere: In the coming weeks and months there will appear to be feverish efforts and activities, all purportedly aimed at ensuring successful conduct of the general elections slated for next year 2011. This is against the infamous distinction that Nigeria has unfortunately earned as a place where free and fair elections cannot be expected.
2011 Elections and the Road to Nowhere: In the coming weeks and months there will appear to be feverish efforts and activities, all purportedly aimed at ensuring successful conduct of the general elections slated for next year 2011. This is against the infamous distinction that Nigeria has unfortunately earned as a place where free and fair elections cannot be expected.
As part of the elaborate façade to burnish this unsavoury reputation and image, there will be all sorts of seminars, conferences, and workshops on the virtues of free and fair elections and such like issues all over the country. There will also be a deluge of contract awards for ballot papers, ballot boxes and other election materials and structures, ensuring instant fortunes for those lucky or well connected enough. To complete the picture of deception, there will be a full complement of carpet bombing publicity intended to give the impression that indeed the 2011 elections will come to finally mark the watershed for elections in Nigeria.
But as you and I know in our hearts including even those whose responsibility will be to organize it, the conduct and outcome of the 2011 elections will not by any stretch of imagination differ significantly from previous elections held in this country. We can all be certain that the ills of previous elections; the deliberate shortage of electoral materials, the contrived confusion at polling booths, the organized snatching and stuffing of ballot boxes with fake ballot papers and the manipulation of results and declaration of false winners will all rear their ugly heads if indeed the 2011 elections come to hold.
We can expect that the political actors in this country will strive to create pre and post election tension in their desire to win at all costs. They will betray, deceive, and sow discord and dis-harmony among the electorate. They will assume as they have always done, that the electorate are gullible and available for manipulation. They will expect that once done the electorate will docilely accept their electoral smash and grab as fait accompli, and swallow without a whimper the all too often glib and self serving exhortation by supposedly concerned elder statesmen to “allow the country move forward”.
Because the political actors have all too often escaped retribution for shortchanging the legitimate political expectations of the Nigerian electorate, they will expect to continue the rapacious pillaging of Nigeria without account, the raison d’etre for the stuff of politics and public service in Nigeria. The rest of us will then be left to cope with the negative consequences of their treachery on the Nigerian nation which has for all practical purposes diminished our once lofty status in the comity of nations.
Indeed by all objective indications, it is clear that with the stakes higher than at any time in the history of elections in this country, the 2011 elections will be a convulsive, all consuming, and do-or-die affair.
Enough really is enough!
Having gone through these experiences, isn’t it time we collectively as a people rose and in many ways said enough is enough? When we all fought to see off the Military, our collective expectation was to usher in a new dawn of civilian democracy undergirded by accountability, responsibility, and service to the electorate. We all hoped that against the background of years of military dictatorship which had denied this country and its people the opportunity to forge ahead, the in-coming civilian democratic dispensation, secured at great human and material cost would take heed and deliver the dividends of democracy and development that the military could not. We expected the political actors to put the interests of the country above pecuniary and self-seeking interests; especially for a country that was crying for development and transformation. Instead what we got from the civilian political actors was more of the same that we got from the military and even worse. We have thus witnessed a steady decline in all facets of our national life; from social services to education, from security of life and property to infrastructure, from energy and power to health services.
Our educational system which produced a Nobel laureate and winners of prestigious international awards has virtually collapsed. The state of our health system is such that our “big men” have to go to neighbouring countries to attend to ailments from simple headaches to child births! From being the reference point in all things African, we are now mentioned in the same breath as the minnows of the continent. Liberia and Sierra Leone, two of the countries whom we helped resuscitated have successfully transited from one election to another without the kind of rancour and acrimony ours have been associated with.
It is now such that all the nations in our peer group of countries, South Korea, Malaysia, Brazil, Indonesia have left us far behind in human and material development.
The most telling indictment against our political actors has been their failure to keep faith with the tenets of democracy that they purport to represent. Many of our political office holders got to their present positions through one kind of chicanery or the other. In practice, rather than submit themselves to the democratic choice of the electorate, they prefer the skullduggery of rigging, fixing, and godfatherism to get to and stay in office. Politics and public service has now been reduced to a matter of the interests of a cabal of godfathers rather than public will. Indeed political and public offices are now shared and allocated to cronies in a manner that subverts and threatens our fledgling Democracy. Little wonder then that our political actors and office holders give scant consideration to the need to uplift the people and the nation.
Imperative for Action: Nigerians must Mobilize, Organize and Act for a New Political Order
The question to ask is how long can we long suffering Nigerians put up with this betrayal of our common weal by self seeking political elite? How long can we allow the political elite to divide and distract our attention from the real issues of lack of accountability and, responsibility of the public offices they occupy purportedly on our behalf? More importantly, how long can we continue to endure a political system that fosters and delivers mediocrity, poverty, retrogression and underdevelopment, instead of excellence, development and growth?
From the objective factors on the ground, it is clear to see that the quest for democracy and development as yearned for by the populace can neither be served nor advanced by the prevailing political structure and system in the country. As it was during the military, it is time for popular will to assert itself and establish a more just, responsible and accountable political order that delivers on the expectations of the people and the nation.
I daresay this imperative is all the more urgent and necessary from an objective reading of the prevailing situation in the country. By our collective resolve and action, we should act to break the yoke of misgovernance that hangs around the neck of our country threatening to drag it down.
From the creeks in the wetlands of Nembe-Bassambiri-Ogolomabiri to the Sahelian fringes of Ilela, Sokoto Nigerians are yearning for a change. From the shining coastline of Topo, Badagry to the borderlands of Gamboru-Ngala, Nigerians deserve better. From scenic Mambilla Plateau to the farming communities on the banks of Oke-Ogun River, our political leaders are clearly in disconnect with the people they purport to represent and serve.
This therefore is a clarion call for concerted action by Nigerians across all faiths, ethnicity, occupation and calling, geography and environment, whether in Nigeria or in the Diaspora to push for the establishment of a new political order based on popular will. In the banking halls, on oil rigs, at market places, motor parks, and university campuses, town halls, at offices of both private and public organizations, Nigerians must mobilize and organize. We must seek all means legal and legitimate in this quest. We must utilize the instruments of mass mobilization and action; the internet, printing of stickers and theme t-shirts, at musical concerts and social occasions to drive home the message that the political system we currently operate based on ability to out rig during elections and political representation based on the whims of political fixers and godfathers must give way to genuine popular choice, transparency and accountability.
To the Armed Forces and Security Agencies
As peacekeepers you have fought and defended gallantly the right of people in a number of countries around the world to live in Freedom and Democracy. In this endeavour you have lost some of your finest men and officers. You have also deservedly won accolades for the professional and sterling way you have gone about your tasks. Yet back home in Nigeria, sadly and unfortunately, you are all too often made to undertake tasks that run contrary to the high professional standards you are known for and the spirit of the awards that you have earned. It must be galling to you that some of the countries where you have helped restored peace are now standing on their feet flourishing, while you own country is languishing and yearning direly for the same ideals that you have fought for in other lands. When your compatriots across the length and breath of this land rise to demand for a new political order from the rot that we presently are in as happened in other lands, you must either support or not hinder the process. If you are ordered to arrest, shoot and kill defenseless women and young men (who incidentally are your own brothers and sisters) in legitimate and peaceful pursuit of a just political order, you should listen to your conscience and morality.
We all have a duty and responsibility towards saving our country and establishing a new political order.
As part of the elaborate façade to burnish this unsavoury reputation and image, there will be all sorts of seminars, conferences, and workshops on the virtues of free and fair elections and such like issues all over the country. There will also be a deluge of contract awards for ballot papers, ballot boxes and other election materials and structures, ensuring instant fortunes for those lucky or well connected enough. To complete the picture of deception, there will be a full complement of carpet bombing publicity intended to give the impression that indeed the 2011 elections will come to finally mark the watershed for elections in Nigeria.
But as you and I know in our hearts including even those whose responsibility will be to organize it, the conduct and outcome of the 2011 elections will not by any stretch of imagination differ significantly from previous elections held in this country. We can all be certain that the ills of previous elections; the deliberate shortage of electoral materials, the contrived confusion at polling booths, the organized snatching and stuffing of ballot boxes with fake ballot papers and the manipulation of results and declaration of false winners will all rear their ugly heads if indeed the 2011 elections come to hold.
We can expect that the political actors in this country will strive to create pre and post election tension in their desire to win at all costs. They will betray, deceive, and sow discord and dis-harmony among the electorate. They will assume as they have always done, that the electorate are gullible and available for manipulation. They will expect that once done the electorate will docilely accept their electoral smash and grab as fait accompli, and swallow without a whimper the all too often glib and self serving exhortation by supposedly concerned elder statesmen to “allow the country move forward”.
Because the political actors have all too often escaped retribution for shortchanging the legitimate political expectations of the Nigerian electorate, they will expect to continue the rapacious pillaging of Nigeria without account, the raison d’etre for the stuff of politics and public service in Nigeria. The rest of us will then be left to cope with the negative consequences of their treachery on the Nigerian nation which has for all practical purposes diminished our once lofty status in the comity of nations.
Indeed by all objective indications, it is clear that with the stakes higher than at any time in the history of elections in this country, the 2011 elections will be a convulsive, all consuming, and do-or-die affair.
Enough really is enough!
Having gone through these experiences, isn’t it time we collectively as a people rose and in many ways said enough is enough? When we all fought to see off the Military, our collective expectation was to usher in a new dawn of civilian democracy undergirded by accountability, responsibility, and service to the electorate. We all hoped that against the background of years of military dictatorship which had denied this country and its people the opportunity to forge ahead, the in-coming civilian democratic dispensation, secured at great human and material cost would take heed and deliver the dividends of democracy and development that the military could not. We expected the political actors to put the interests of the country above pecuniary and self-seeking interests; especially for a country that was crying for development and transformation. Instead what we got from the civilian political actors was more of the same that we got from the military and even worse. We have thus witnessed a steady decline in all facets of our national life; from social services to education, from security of life and property to infrastructure, from energy and power to health services.
Our educational system which produced a Nobel laureate and winners of prestigious international awards has virtually collapsed. The state of our health system is such that our “big men” have to go to neighbouring countries to attend to ailments from simple headaches to child births! From being the reference point in all things African, we are now mentioned in the same breath as the minnows of the continent. Liberia and Sierra Leone, two of the countries whom we helped resuscitated have successfully transited from one election to another without the kind of rancour and acrimony ours have been associated with.
It is now such that all the nations in our peer group of countries, South Korea, Malaysia, Brazil, Indonesia have left us far behind in human and material development.
The most telling indictment against our political actors has been their failure to keep faith with the tenets of democracy that they purport to represent. Many of our political office holders got to their present positions through one kind of chicanery or the other. In practice, rather than submit themselves to the democratic choice of the electorate, they prefer the skullduggery of rigging, fixing, and godfatherism to get to and stay in office. Politics and public service has now been reduced to a matter of the interests of a cabal of godfathers rather than public will. Indeed political and public offices are now shared and allocated to cronies in a manner that subverts and threatens our fledgling Democracy. Little wonder then that our political actors and office holders give scant consideration to the need to uplift the people and the nation.
Imperative for Action: Nigerians must Mobilize, Organize and Act for a New Political Order
The question to ask is how long can we long suffering Nigerians put up with this betrayal of our common weal by self seeking political elite? How long can we allow the political elite to divide and distract our attention from the real issues of lack of accountability and, responsibility of the public offices they occupy purportedly on our behalf? More importantly, how long can we continue to endure a political system that fosters and delivers mediocrity, poverty, retrogression and underdevelopment, instead of excellence, development and growth?
From the objective factors on the ground, it is clear to see that the quest for democracy and development as yearned for by the populace can neither be served nor advanced by the prevailing political structure and system in the country. As it was during the military, it is time for popular will to assert itself and establish a more just, responsible and accountable political order that delivers on the expectations of the people and the nation.
I daresay this imperative is all the more urgent and necessary from an objective reading of the prevailing situation in the country. By our collective resolve and action, we should act to break the yoke of misgovernance that hangs around the neck of our country threatening to drag it down.
From the creeks in the wetlands of Nembe-Bassambiri-Ogolomabiri to the Sahelian fringes of Ilela, Sokoto Nigerians are yearning for a change. From the shining coastline of Topo, Badagry to the borderlands of Gamboru-Ngala, Nigerians deserve better. From scenic Mambilla Plateau to the farming communities on the banks of Oke-Ogun River, our political leaders are clearly in disconnect with the people they purport to represent and serve.
This therefore is a clarion call for concerted action by Nigerians across all faiths, ethnicity, occupation and calling, geography and environment, whether in Nigeria or in the Diaspora to push for the establishment of a new political order based on popular will. In the banking halls, on oil rigs, at market places, motor parks, and university campuses, town halls, at offices of both private and public organizations, Nigerians must mobilize and organize. We must seek all means legal and legitimate in this quest. We must utilize the instruments of mass mobilization and action; the internet, printing of stickers and theme t-shirts, at musical concerts and social occasions to drive home the message that the political system we currently operate based on ability to out rig during elections and political representation based on the whims of political fixers and godfathers must give way to genuine popular choice, transparency and accountability.
To the Armed Forces and Security Agencies
As peacekeepers you have fought and defended gallantly the right of people in a number of countries around the world to live in Freedom and Democracy. In this endeavour you have lost some of your finest men and officers. You have also deservedly won accolades for the professional and sterling way you have gone about your tasks. Yet back home in Nigeria, sadly and unfortunately, you are all too often made to undertake tasks that run contrary to the high professional standards you are known for and the spirit of the awards that you have earned. It must be galling to you that some of the countries where you have helped restored peace are now standing on their feet flourishing, while you own country is languishing and yearning direly for the same ideals that you have fought for in other lands. When your compatriots across the length and breath of this land rise to demand for a new political order from the rot that we presently are in as happened in other lands, you must either support or not hinder the process. If you are ordered to arrest, shoot and kill defenseless women and young men (who incidentally are your own brothers and sisters) in legitimate and peaceful pursuit of a just political order, you should listen to your conscience and morality.
We all have a duty and responsibility towards saving our country and establishing a new political order.
googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('comments'); });
googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('content1'); });
googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('content2'); });