4th April, 2011
Professor Attahiru Jega’s stoppage of the National Assembly elections last Saturday is another step backwards for a democracy which after twelve years is still tottering on the brink.
With all the preparations put in place, and the billions of naira disbursed to the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, to ensure a hitch free elections, Jega’s announcement came as a rude shock.
Apart from having very little respect for Nigerians, INEC seems to relish treating us with contempt.
Last week, Professor Jega had announced that INEC was ready for the polls as it had recruited and trained about 400,000 staff and supervisory officials and that INEC was doing its best to see that results are announced within 48 hours, but alas, INEC, failed woefully.
The same INEC has now acknowledged poor logistics which include late arrival of result sheets, late arrival of INEC officials, late accreditation, discrepancies in the ballot papers, mix up in the supply of ballot papers and missing names, which were noticed during the last display of voter registers but were not included in the register used for the cancelled election.
After spending an outrageous N87.7 billion and an additional N6 billion to prepare for the elections, it seems incredible that the elections started so badly.
We are forced to ask again: What went wrong? Agreed, Prof Jega cannot do it alone, but how sure is the Professor about his lieutenants? Can Jega beat his chest and say he trusts them all?
Saturday’s waste of precious time and resources has also cost the nation and Nigerians a lot of money, with borders closed and business places locked up.
The questions keep coming back. Who was responsible for this national embarrassment? How come Jega assured Nigerians when he was not so sure? Who misled the professor? Several questions, fewer answers.
And now that the damage has been done, INEC must brace up to face the challenge and restore the confidence of Nigerians.
We pray Nigerians will give INEC another chance by coming out to vote next Saturday. INEC needs more than apologies, the electoral body needs to do its work properly before Saturday because Nigerians won’t take any excuses for another failure.