Two days to the February 25 presidential election in Nigeria, the Convener of the Big Tent for Obi/Datti presidential ticket, and Leader of the Labour Party (LP), Professor Pat Utomi, has appealed to the international election observers to do their work with commitment and objectivity.
Utomi said this on Wednesday in Lagos at a press conference, noting that the call became necessary following his observations on the activities of foreign election observers in Nigeria during the last presidential elections.
He accused the international election observers of unwittingly suppressing democracy in Nigeria as their role as an inoculation effect on the rights of citizens to elect the candidates they want to lead them.
“Their palliative call for calm when the rage of the cheated swells up is the reason Nigerian lies prostrate. I am beginning to take exception to election observers being a whitewash on abuse by the fascist oriented who are bent on abusing elections,” he said.
Professor Utomi noted that foreign missions in Nigeria knew the Nigerian politicians who have invested much in violence, voter intimidation and suppression, including manipulating voter registers to disenfranchise voters, just as they also knew the very corrupt politicians who buy votes and use stolen public funds to block access for citizens, but chose to look the other way.
He accused them of preaching one thing in public and courting the politicians so they could be partners in asymmetric relations between the centre of the metropole and the centre of the periphery of poor struggling countries that are prevented from progress by the so-called politicians.
“The currency of the centre-periphery thesis of international political economy may have run out decades back but Nigeria’s retrogression proves its validity and veracity,” he added.
Utomi also called for the establishment of an international crimes court where politicians who rig elections and those who intimidate and suppress voters during elections would be tried and punished accordingly.
He, therefore, called on Nigerians to rise up, go out enmasse on Saturday to change history by replicating what happened in Kano between Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso and Ibrahim Shekarau in 2023.
“Shekarau as a teacher challenged Kwankwaso who was a sitting governor with all the state powers but the will of the people of Kano prevailed at the end and Shekarau was declared winner because they voted and guarded their votes to ensure that nobody stole it. These young people who rose up must now know that their future is in their hands and not in these fancy arrangements which only mortgage their future. I salute their solidarity chant – if we die, we die,” he said.
Utomi expressed worry about what he called INEC’s poor performance in PVC distribution as well as the creation of new polling units and the speculations that people considered a threat to certain interests by the look of their names were being posted miles away knowing that restricted movements would disenfranchise them.
He also insisted that the Lagos Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), Olusegun Agbaje must be reassigned as a matter of urgency before the election.
“I have watched INEC treat with kid’s gloves the widespread calls for the rearrangement of its REC in Lagos. Not to respond to that is a big question mark on the credibility of the elections, and I call on the international community to note this point. The Nigerian people want Mr. Segun Agbaje redeployed. His skills can be as valuable in Jigawa as they are in Lagos,” he said.
He commended the Chief of Defence Staff, General Lucky Irabor, whom he said had given assurance that the military would provide adequate security during the elections.
“They gave us assurance and we want to take them by their words,” he said.
He called on all Nigerians including those who did not get their PVCs to go out and form citizens’ army, which is the most important security, so as to be able to secure their votes.
“Nigerians should create social barriers or what is called the people’s army. They must mobilize to vote massively and stay at the polling centres until the results are uploaded,” Utomi stated.
