“There is no dependence that can be sure but a dependence upon one’s self.” ― JOHN GAY
So long as Nigerians are unwilling to confront their monsters frontally, so long will they have to live with electoral fraud.
Nigerians were expecting the West to stop the Bola Tinubu swearing-in because he has a questionable mandate, a malady, and quite unwieldy baggage. Interesting! What Nigerian people won’t do for themselves because of multifarious interests, they want the West to do. The reason democracy is remaining at a mediocre performance level in Nigeria is that the people, instead of charting their course by themselves, wait for others to show them the way. What a shame!
Nigeria, over time, has shown by its attitude that its politics is copied and not original. This has shown in the way they practice it, trying to force a this-is-Nigeria attitude into what was copied. What obtains today in our country is that we have not been able to practice what we copied diligently; neither have we been able to inject our peculiarities into it. Our democracy is neither here nor there, yet we expect positive results.
After independence in 1960, Great Britain gave Nigeria what they know best, the parliamentary system of government. That is what it has practiced for hundreds of years. But within six years we disrupted our own with an attitude that is neither indigenous nor foreign but fueled more by the greed and corruption of the politicians. The crisis that trailed our independence leading to the military sacking the civilians for what they tagged indiscipline, corruption, and lack of playing by the rule, did not come to the colonial masters as a surprise, knowing that you cannot pack strange bedfellows in a room and expect to enjoy serenity inside and within the environs.
But it suited Britain’s interest to deploy the natural endowments of the South to maintain the North and to use the large population of the North to control the confident and more progressive South. By so doing, London showed unreadiness to deploy any resources to manage the big giant emerging from Africa.
No wonder, soon after the new nation-state set sail, the ship became a wreck … in just six years. Then the ding-dong set in from military coup to civil war and back to military rule and again to civil rule and back to military and now to civil rule. In all, the civil rule interventions that the West tagged democracy, popularly defined as the government of the people, for the people, and by the people, none met the basic ingredients of that form of government.
For 24 years that civil rule has been in practice in this country, the longest since independence without a military interregnum, there have been seven general elections. Only one of them came close to free and fair where the people had their say and their way and that was in 2015. No wonder it was the only presidential election in Nigeria’s history that was not challenged in court. Thanks to the humane and democratic disposition of the-then President Goodluck Jonathan. He kept his word that his presidential ambition is not worth the blood of any Nigerian.
That era remains Nigeria’s finest, locally and internationally, even though what that election produced in Muhammadu Buhari as president turned out to be an aggravated disaster whose impact will live with the country for a long time. The military who sacked the first self-rule in the country, citing corruption and indiscipline by politicians, ended up fertilizing corruption. The endemic corruption in our system today has its underpinnings laid during the 30-plus years of military rule.
Nothing underscores how low we have gone in our democratic evolution than the fact that not a few frustrated Nigerians are wishing for the return of the same military. They loathe what is being operated as democracy in our clime today.
After the military disrupted the parliamentary system introduced by the colonial administration, they foisted on us a presidential system copiously copied from the United States. From 1979 to 1983, and 1999 to date, the country has been practicing this system but going through the heavy burden akin to going into a business you had limited knowledge of its operations. In truth, the presidential system, as copied, is antithetical to the African tradition. But that notwithstanding, the real reason why it has failed in Nigeria is that it provided room for our differences to germinate and bloom.
In bequeathing to us the parliamentary system at independence, the colonialists knew our dissimilarities and provided a system that could cope with them–a loose center and strong regions where everyone will move at their pace without limiting the growth of the other. But the military junta, in its naivety, thought the parliamentary system was engendering more indiscipline by politicians and they decided to collapse the federal system and introduce a near confederate system. This system has helped to stud development and create acrimony with the widening imbalance in all spheres.
Meanwhile, in the US from where the presidential system was copied, it was running a complete and unadulterated federal system but in our instance, the military junta, operating from a jaundiced backdrop, decided to weaken the federating units (states in this case) under a presidential system with near-absolute power at the center. It’s for this reason that the country’s biggest agitation, besides the extreme case for outright separation from Nigeria, is for the restructuring of the country.
Several good heads in the political field believe that the current structure of Nigeria is contradictory and oppugnant to development, equity, and fairness which is needed for peace and progress in any nation. But as justifiable as the pro-restructuring argument is, the resistance to it is still very conspicuous for the reason of interests and needless fear of the unknown.
Among the most outstanding variables that have held us down politically are impunity, corruption, and dependence on external forces for our results. When we hold power we do things in clear disregard of the rule of law, in clear disrespect for the other person. We use political power arbitrarily and use looted public funds unabashedly to gain access to political power.
And because we are docile, we take the shit and wait for the international community to come and fight for us. The crooked electoral umpire fears only the international observers and often try to lure them into their dirty deals. The political parties, instead of preparing an antidote to electoral fraud, are busy pampering international observers. A fraudulent government is concerned with meeting the demands/requirements of international observers. The populace whose mandate is being trampled upon, instead of standing up to defend their votes, are waiting for the West to cry more than the bereaved.
The congratulatory message from the American president was causing much heat here after the February 25 presidential fraud, the worst in our history. Federal Government had to send a minister to the US to lobby for a congratulatory message. Our revered literary icon Chimamanda Adichie had to even put a note across to President Joe Biden to stop the congratulatory message. As usual, the US played clever by half by respecting the two interests. The message did not come from the President but he honored the diplomatic invitation to the swearing-in ceremony of the man he did not congratulate. Tinubu’s celebration of the phone call from the Secretary of State was like the joy of a kid after being hosted by Santa Claus.
Some Nigerians have been berating Joe Biden for the US to attend and witness the Tinubu inauguration, arguing that America should know that Tinubu has a history of narcotics, corruption, and other nasty baggage. What this shows is how pedestrian our democracy is. We are expecting another person to come and do our fight even when we continue to assert our independence in other jurisdictions. Expecting America to reject Tinubu because he stole a mandate is tantamount to a household that has a gun to defend themselves from armed robbers, but refuses to use it when the robbers came, instead, the family blames police and vigilante for allowing the robbers to escape.
How do we expect the international community to take us seriously when we have been complaining of electoral fraud for years and no single person is in jail as a result since 1999 after seven general elections? How do we expect the world to take us seriously when voices like Femi Fani-Kayode who screamed blue murder against the APC in 2015 and 2019 are today praising the same people it criticized and calling it a godsend? What has become very pertinent is that fundamental change is what is required before we can qualify to be among the democratic nations. Otherwise, let’s dump it.
