Nigeria needs electoral reforms now!

Eze Onyekpere([email protected])

Recent developments in our electoral dispute resolution, from the election petitions tribunals to the Supreme Court, have brought to the fore the need for electoral reforms in Nigeria.

It is imperative to state that reforming the electoral system is not a new national demand, but it has been a challenge accentuated by developments since the return to civil rule in 1999. Democracy is about one vote per voter and the votes of the electorate are expected to decide the winner of every poll. It is about the opportunity for the people to choose their leaders in an atmosphere and process that can be described as free, fair and credible. Can we in truth and honesty state that a majority of our election results, since the return to civil rule, reflected the wishes of the majority? The answer must be in the negative.

Tied to policy and legislative electoral reforms is the need to rethink and recalibrate electoral jurisprudence and how the courts arrive at a decision in election petitions before them. This is because the dry letters of the law and its interpretation are inseparable, and reforms must be done on the upstream which is legislative reform as well as the downstream which is judicial interpretation of the laws. Experts have posited that electoral disputes are not just civil claims in which individuals ventilate their private grievances or pursue personal aggrandisement. The claims have wider significance for the integrity of our constitutional democracy and political stability.

It is evident that Nigeria has missed so many opportunities for legislative electoral reforms. These missed opportunities arose from the negligence, lethargy and selfish interests of past and current presidents. Also, members of the legislature may have contributed to these missed opportunities. The Umaru Yar’Adua administration appointed the Justice Muhammadu Uwais Committee came out with far-reaching recommendations for electoral reforms. Considering the background of the events that led to the setting up of the committee, the quality of the experts in the committee and the admission by President Yar’Adua that the election that brought him to power was manipulated, Nigerians thought that recommendations of the committee would be taken seriously and implemented to the letter in terms of new the laws and policies. But the hope of reforms was dashed as soon as it had been kindled. The Goodluck Jonathan administration that took over from the late Yar’Adua did not follow up on the reforms. That opportunity for comprehensive reform was wasted.

Again, before the 2015 elections, the Independent National Electoral Commission under Professor Attahiru Jega introduced the card reader for accreditation of voters which would have helped to reform the manual processes that are always susceptible to abuse leading to inflation of votes. Unfortunately, the card reader was a policy intervention of INEC that was not founded on the 1999 Constitution, Electoral Act or any other law. In a long list of decided electoral disputes, the Supreme Court upheld the supremacy of the manual voter register which was backed by the Electoral Act against the novel smart card reader which was merely a policy intervention of INEC. It further held that the legislature should make specific exclusive provisions on the use of the card reader as well as being explicit on the implications and consequences of the failure to use the smart card reader. So many Nigerians were unhappy and indeed angry with the decisions of the Supreme Court on the card reader and some even went as far as accusing the court of aiding and abetting election rigging.

It was therefore the predominant national opinion that taking a hint from the decisions of the Supreme Court, the National Assembly and President Muhammadu Buhari will take the earliest opportunity to amend the Electoral Act to position the smart card reader properly. The National Assembly fulfilled its side of the bargain and brought the Electoral Act amendment bill to the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.) on four occasions. The first presentation for his assent was well over a year to the elections. For specious reasons, the President declined assent and raised some issues which the National Assembly addressed and brought back for his assent. The President further raised some more issues for the second and third times which the National Assembly still addressed and sent back to him. It was on the forth sending back for his assent that he ran out of substantial issues and now stated that the time was too short for the bill to be used as a law to guide the 2019 elections. From the above scenario, it was clear the President deliberately sabotaged the amendment of the Electoral Act to inter alia properly position the card reader as an effective instrument to curtail election rigging and other manipulations.

Now, the country is back to square one, where the nation is divided on the decision of the Supreme Court, especially on the Imo State governorship tussle. This case would have been resolved in a way and manner satisfactory to the electorate if the card reader and other reforms had been empowered by law. The downstream reforms start with the imperative of rethinking the goal of electoral adjudication. This writer posits that the ultimate goal should be to ensure that the votes count which tallies with the idea of substantial justice. The sui generis nature of election petitions should not be an excuse for depriving the electorate of their choice whilst hiding under undue technicalities that serve no useful purpose. The judiciary is constitutionally empowered to determine civil rights and obligations on the basis of the law and justice and not on some abstract technicalities that do not conform to substantial justice. The judiciary, especially the Supreme Court also needs to be consistent in its rulings so that established norms, standards and practices can be seen to have been followed in virtually all its decisions where the facts are the same.

Democracy is severely discredited when the votes do not count, and citizens are bound to lose faith and question the usefulness of democratic institutions. This is so especially in an environment of mass poverty, unemployment and backwardness. Buhari has recently promised to bequeath a free and credible electoral process on or before the expiration of his tenure. He needs to walk the talk. He should not wait for the National Assembly to take the lead. He should send an executive bill to the National Assembly and this bill should include inter alia card reader reforms, definitive central server, access to information by all Nigerians as soon as votes are concluded at the polling units, campaign finance reforms and provisions to change the jurisprudential basis of the current adjudication system to reflect more of substantial justice than technicalities, etc. The Electoral Bill amendment should get expeditious legislative attention so that on or before the end of June 2020, the bill will be ready for assent to become law.

Electoral reforms now; we need not wait until a few months to the elections in 2023. The staggered governorship elections will give us the opportunity to test the reforms and if they are not delivering on the promises, we can still reform the reforms, so that the 2023 presidential election will run on a template where the votes count.