By Zik Gbemre
We find it appalling that some Nigerians are insinuating a lot of things over last weekend’s postponement of the Presidential and National Assembly elections by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), which was earlier slated for February 16,2019, and now postponed to February 23rd, 2019. And they made it look as if it was the fault of the Muhammadu Buhari Presidency, and that the Buhari Presidency is up to something.
Some have even called on the developed nations to intervene in the situation. But we would like to ask, Is Nigeria no longer a sovereign nation that has the right to decide how it wants to handle its elections? Does Nigeria interfere with other nation’s internal politics/elections? Nigeria, being an independent sovereign nation and a seat-member of the United Nations (UN), deserves the exclusive right to conduct its internal general elections the way it sees necessary. And the INEC, is constitutionally obligated to conduct general elections in the country as it is required by the Nigerian Constitution. Those sharing cooked up broadcast in this regard on social media, to make the Presidency look like the bad guy here manipulating the system, should desist from doing so, for it not helping our democracy.
The developed nations, which the opposition party – PDP and its members are calling on to interfere in Nigerian elections, have they for once called on Nigeria to interfere in their own internal politics and electioneering process? Agreed that the international community can come in as ‘observers’ of Nigeria’s elections, but they are not to be involved in the election directly or moderating how things should be done. They can only observe, and it ends there.
People should be informed and reminded that the first time former President Goodluck Jonathon was elected through the polls during the 2011 Presidential elections held on 16th April 2011, it was actually postponed from 9th April 2011 by the then INEC Chairman, Prof. Attahiru Jega. Also in 2015, the Presidential election was shifted from February 14th to March 28th, 2015; while the Governorship and Assembly elections scheduled for 28th February were shifted to 11th April, 2015. The elections were postponed because of security issues. But even in the said previous 2011 elections, the National Assembly elections were postponed on the day the election was to be held due to ‘logistics failures’. Just the same way the current 2019 has been postponed. So, what is all the fuse about?
While we urge that INEC should continue to improve on its functions in the conduct of free and fair elections across the country to avoid a repeat of such postponement of elections in future elections, people should however stop raising unnecessary dusts on national issues where there is none.
Zik Gbemre.
National Coordinator
Niger Delta Peace Coalition (NDPC)
We Mobilize Others to Fight for Individual Causes as if Those Were Our Cause
