Weekly Trust Friday, July 19, 2002
Effect of non- budget implementation on the electoral process
Wada Nas
Sometime in August last year, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, if it is indeed and in fact truly independent, announced that it was going to embark on the registration of voters the following October. It later shifted it to November 2001 and January 2002.
The commission had hoped that considering the centrality of the exercise to the entire democratic process, the ugly principle of non-implementation of budget, which has become the standard practice since 1999, would not apply to it.
When its officials noticed early in the day that funds for the exercise were not forthcoming, it went public alerting the nation that the failure, if not deliberate refusal, to release the required funds for the exercise may cause a shift in all the elections.
Still, the administration remained unmoved and unbothered. When in April or so, INEC summoned those seeking to register political parties, the Ministry of Finance quickly announced that it has released about N7 billion that day to the commission. At the meeting, Alhaji Balarabe Musa disputed this and challenged the commission in the presence of the finance minister to confirm the release. Thus, an exercise that was supposed to have been completed in Nov. 2001 is yet to take off upto this moment 13/07/02.
We can clearly see how the non-implementation of budget, which has become the standard practice of this administration, is badly heating up the system, perhaps to the delight of some administration officials who may hope for the so-called "theory of necessity" to apply to all the forthcoming elections.
To make matters worse, INEC itself is not helping matters. Just less than a month to the council elections scheduled for August 10, it is yet to educate the people on the registration process let alone inform them on when actual registration would start. As if this is not bad enough, it decided to smuggle some foreign elements into the registration process contrary to the Electoral Act. There is nowhere the Act says that a photograph of a voter is a precondition for voting.
Nigerians know that INEC was specifically instructed to include this as part of the registration requirement, which itself is part of a hidden agenda to unilaterally change the known demographic composition of the country which has been in place right in the 1920’s and even earlier. Even the outcome of all elections since before independence has consistently confirmed the demographic composition of the country.
Still worsening matters, INEC is devoting only five days to such an important exercise on the silly excuse that Nigerians come out to register only three days to the end of the exercise. Even if this is so, it refuses to take account of the fact that we are in the rainy season.
Contrary to the belief by some people, the Arewa Consultative Forum is not drawing attention to this only because it would affect the North. The truth is that almost all parts of the country would be affected except perhaps for those who allegedly have since been registered secretly on allegation though very difficult to prove, but may not be impossible to undertake.
The people of the riverine areas of the country, a lot of hill dwellers and areas where there is no electricity supply would equally be worst hit.
Let me recall that towards the approach to the 1983 elections, the then Federal Electoral Commission, FEDECO announced its intention to introduce electronic voting. No sooner was the announcement made than the late Awolowo, then leader of the UPN ordered his supporters nationwide to destroy such electronic voting machines, insisting that the electricity supply level in the country didn’t favour such a development. This was how the matter ended.
Today we are faced with photographic voting which cannot be supported by the same electricity supply level, for which Awolowo ordered the destruction of the intended electronic voting machines. I do not see much difference between the machine and the attempt to depopulate some people through "photographic voting," an intended clear rigging at source, which INEC, in collaboration with some undemocratic forces want to impose on the country outside the due process of the law.
If the nation allows INEC to get away with this, then the continued violation of the law to satisfy the pet schemes of some power hungry people would become unlimited in the years ahead. Nigerians should therefore have the courage to resist, in a very lawful and democratic manner, any attempt by INEC, or whosoever, to impose rules on us that are clearly outside the confines of the law.
What should worry us in all this, however, is why this administration is deliberately interested in heating up the system unnecessarily. It is either smuggling foreign elements into the electoral bill, or trying to muzzle the National Assembly in order to reduce it to rubber stamp, or refusing to implement budget provisions, except in areas which favours a few, or engages in constitutional violations all in attempts to heat up the system for purely selfish reasons.
The smuggling of voting by photograph into the electoral process by INEC clearly questions its claim to independence. From the way things have been going, it is difficult to hesitate concluding that INEC is out to fulfil certain agenda in the pursuit of the narrow political interest of some groups. Indeed, it is for this reason that funds were not released to the commission in good time so as to frustrate the electoral process.
President Obasanjo is on record as having said that his party, which also means himself favours the conduct of the presidential election first before the other elections. The simple reason is that faced with imminent defeat in the council polls in his immediate constituency, this would tell a lot about his credibility as a presidential candidate having no home base again. The trick is to get AD vote for him during the presidential election, after which his party may turn the heat on them in the other elections.
Of course, AD may be assured of smooth sail in the other elections but I can bet that once he secures their votes, nothing would stop him and his followers in the South-West from ravaging the Oduduwa terrain. After all, this administration is not known for keeping promises. The National Assembly quickly passed the 2002 budget on the firm understanding that this time around its provisions would be implemented. What is the situation today? Non- implementation of budgets has never been as worse.
Meantime, as INEC gears up towards conducting the registration exercise, the need for adequate publicity is quite very central as also the need to operate strictly within the law. Let the commission be frankly told that it must be extra careful not to put doubts in the minds of many about its role in the entire democratic process. INEC has a lot of lessons to learn from disputed elections over the years. So it should take care not to prove to be worse than all previous electoral bodies.
Having said that, it was with utter shock I read the story that one of the key witnesses in the Bola Ige case has escaped to a neighbouring country. If true, and the story has not been denied so far, what do we make of this? What does it mean to the crusaders of human rights?
I have already made the point that we need another Oputa to critically look at human rights violations since 1999. It is important to do this. The rampant killing of innocent citizens by the Police, the massacre in Odi and Zaki-Biam, the murder of Bola Ige and several others demand for another Oputa to carry out this.