BY ROTIMI DUROJAIYE
Nigerians’ aversion for voting during elections is well pronounced, but the challenge saw a new low in the just concluded governorship election in Anambra State.
The Independent National Electoral Commission declared Charles Chukwuma Soludo of the All Progressives Grand Alliance the winner of the November 6 governorship election in the state.
Soludo polled a total of 112, 229 votes to defeat his closest rival, Valentine Ozigbo of the People’s Democratic Party who scored 53, 807 to emerge second.
Andy Uba of the All Progressives Congress got a total of 43,285 votes to emerge the third position.
Ifeanyi Ubah of the Young Progressive Party came fourth with 21,261 votes. Ubah also won in one local government, same as Ozigbo, with Soludo winning in the remaining 19 local governments.
The outcome shows that only about three in 100 registered voters showed up to vote in the election.
Going by the 2020 population estimate, Anambra State has a population of about 11,400,000 people.
It also has a total registered voters of 2,466,638.
Total accredited voters for the election were 241,090 representing only 9.77% of registered voters and 2.11% of the entire population.
Total valid votes were 229,521; 7,841 votes were rejected, while the total votes cast were 237,362.
The figures represent a low turnout of voters and that only 229,521 people have determined the fate of 11.4 million people.
It is sad that only two percent of the population has decided who will lead the entire population and everybody in the state will have to live with the consequences of the decision of the two per cent that voted.
An independent election observer group, Yiaga Africa, bemoaned the lackadaisical attitude of Anambra people in the governorship election.
The group stated this while briefing reporters in Awka as part of its election monitoring activities in the state.
A board member of Yiaga Africa, Ezenwa Nwagwu, said there were no visible signs to suggest that insecurity would hamper the election.
Nwagwu said the trend where a winner had emerged with only 230,000 votes in Anambra which had two million voters since the beginning of the Fourth Republic, was ugly and unfortunate.
He said security threats had always been there in the past and should be guarded against.
The major challenge, he said, is to get the electorate to come out and cast their votes.
He said Yiaga Africa was engaging with relevant stakeholders, including the police, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, traditional rulers, the media and political parties to change the narrative of elections in the state.
Nwagwu said the group deployed 548 workers to polling units, collation centres and other layers of the election process.
He urged residents of the state who had attained voting age to endeavour to register and ensure that they cast their votes in subsequent elections.
Another board member of Yiaga Africa, Nnamdi Aduba, decried the “level of docility” among politicians which was responsible for outcomes that were different from the real process.
Aduba, a professor, said observer findings were good evidence in times of disputes.
In his presentation, the Project Manager at Yiaga Africa, Paul James, said the group would deploy “Watching The Vote” to 250 of the 5,720 polling units in the state to capture the true situation on the election day.
James said the technology was successfully used in elections in Africa and that activities of Yiaga Africa were used as a guide for producing a better electoral environment in Nigeria.
President Muhammadu Buhari won his re-election in 2019 as he polled 15,191,847 votes to defeat his closest rival, Atiku Abubakar of the PDP in the presidential poll conducted on February 23, 2019.
Atiku polled 11,262,978 to lose the election with a margin of 3,928,869 votes.
According to the constitution of Nigeria, a presidential candidate must have nothing less than 25 percent of votes cast in at least two-thirds or 24 states of the federation. The candidate should also have majority votes in the election.
President Buhari had more than 25 per cent of the election in over 24 states.
Atiku also had 25 per cent of the total votes cast in over 24 states but lost the poll when the simple majority rule condition was applied.
While President Buhari won in 19 states, Atiku won in 17 states and the FCT.
The states Buhari won were Bauchi, Borno, Ekiti, Gombe, Jigawa, Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Kebbi, Kogi, Kwara, Lagos, Nasarawa, Niger, Ogun, Osun, Sokoto, Yobe and Zamfara.
Atiku won in Abia, Adamawa, Akwa Ibom, Anambra, Bayelsa, Benue, Cross River, Delta, Ebonyi, Edo, Enugu, Imo, Ondo, Oyo, Plateau, Rivers, Taraba and the FCT.
The fact of the November 6 governorship election in Anambra State should not shock anyone. It reinforces a pattern of voter apathy that has crept into Nigeria’s democratic elections since 2011.
It is the result of the terrible elections supervised by Maurice Iwu in 2007 and the bad governance Nigeria has had since 1999.
“It is sad that only two per cent of the population has decided who will lead the entire population and everybody in the state will have to live with the consequences of the decision of the two per cent that voted
The 2007 elections were so bad that only an admission of guilt by the winner in that election, the late President Umaru Yar’Adua, could buy peace for the country.
The now-famous Muhammadu Uwais Electoral Committee set up by Yar’Adua made far-reaching recommendations for electoral reforms to improve Nigeria’s democracy.
Today, key recommendations for guaranteeing transparency and credibility of elections to deter violence and criminality, and hold perpetrators to account continue to be scorned and held in contempt by those in power.
Apathy and legitimacy have connections with economic wellbeing. Democracy since 1999 has left out the majority from its benefits.
The majority of rural Nigerians live in darkness. Nigeria is now judged as the poverty capital of the world, while inequality remains endemic.
Access to water, education, affordable health, good roads, and critical infrastructure continues to elude the majority. And now, insecurity is the capstone.
Why won’t Nigerians stay away from elections?
Today, voters’ apathy is visible in our presidential, governorship, and legislative elections. It rears its ugly head both in our off-cycle and regular elections. The situation is even worse in our local government election.
In the 2019 elections, only 28.6 million out of 84 million registered voters (representing 36.66 per cent) voted. President Buhari only got elected to office by a “majority of a minority” as 53 million eligible Nigerian voters stayed away from the exercise.
A peep into the pattern of apathy at the state level is telling. Only 17.82% of eligible voters in Abia State participated in the 2019 presidential election, a fall from 77.9% in 2011. In Bayelsa, the turnout fell from 85.6% in 2011 to 36.38% in 2019. In Lagos, 5.4 million eligible voters (82%) did not vote in 2019, while 3.5 million and 2.2 million eligible voters stayed away in Kano and Kaduna, respectively, in the same year.
There is a correlation between citizens’ participation in elections and economic prosperity in any democracy. When rights and responsibilities are suspended or abused at will without consequences, democracy is threatened, and accountability takes flight.
Over the years, cries to make socio-economic rights justiciable and state obligation have fallen on deaf ears. Nigeria’s democracy is hollow without these rights.
Without them, the politician has no obligation to provide education, health, shelter, jobs, food for the common person.
So, the “commoner” who votes gets nothing. In desperation, they are now voting with their legs, choosing to stay away from elections.
The politicians, on the other hand, are better off without the electorate. They have fewer votes to buy or procure during elections, and as the saying goes, it is “carry go” for them. The politician has just the godfathers and the party to worry about. Whether the people show up or not doesn’t really matter.
Indeed, the desperate politician is better off when the people stay away as their ballots are either left unused or stuffed in boxes for the highest bidder. They win all the same. The party wins too. The people lose. Nigeria loses even more as the vicious cycle is repeated in sophistication and unimaginable magnitude.
The outcome of the Anambra election has dawned on Nigerians again the power of an organized, committed minority.
A small group of people with an organized system of thought can change their world.
With the 2023 elections around the corner, Nigerians should change their apathy towards elections and vote. Social media argument and analysis do not decide who rules the people.
