In four days’, time, precisely on Saturday, February 25, 2023, Nigerians of voting age will file out in their numbers for the presidential and National Assembly elections. The poll will be held in 176,606 polling units across the country.
According to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) there are 93.5million registered voters for this year’s elections.
These are the Nigerians that have been empowered by their permanent voters’ cards (PVCs) to determine the course of the country for the next four years. They are the ones that would choose the next president for the country and what they do or fail to do on Saturday will determine whether Nigeria will move forward or backward. It is also these 93.5million Nigerians that would determine the character of the next National Assembly. This is a responsibility that should not be taken lightly by the voters. It is a call to national duty!
The vote ought to be exercised with deep sense of love for country and its future! Any wrong choices made will not only affect the present generation but will also cascade onto the next generation. Without a doubt the most significant choice that the electorate would make on Saturday is in choosing the president of the country. Voters will have to pick one candidate out of the 18 presidential candidates nominated by 18 registered political parties in the country. But if truth must be told, out of the 18 presidential candidates, about 14 have fallen by the way side because they did not campaign across the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Abuja. These 14 presidential candidates have not shown commitment in this race for the most important job in Nigeria. They are mere place holders!
The race has essentially been narrowed to a four-horse race, even as some think that it is actually a three-horse race. However, the choice for the next president of Nigeria before the voters is between the presidential candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu; the presidential candidate of the main opposition party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar; the presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Mr Peter Obi; and the presidential candidate of the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP), Alhaji Rabiu Kwankwaso. These presidential candidates and their political parties have traversed the length and breadth of the country campaigning and selling their manifestos to Nigerians.
Their campaigns will wind down and totally stop on Thursday two days to the election, in line with the Electoral Act 2022.
To the Nigerian voters stepping out on Saturday to vote for the next president, there are certain criteria that a president needs to meet to worth the vote of Nigerians, unless we want to continue to remain hungry and insecure.
If we vote the way that we have been voting since 1999 then nothing will change and indeed the country will continue to deteriorate economically, socially, politically and developmentally. It is obvious to every discernable voter that things have continued to get worse with every successive election circle. This will continue unless we do things differently this time around. It was the late Physicist and Nobel Laureate Albert Einstein who was quoted as saying that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.
We have voted for leaders based on religious or ethnic affinity, and, the country has been going downhill with each vote. All the developmental statistics have remained negative despite or because of our votes. Nigerians are the most terrorized people in the world.
Nigeria is the poverty capital of the world. Nigeria with over 20million out of school is the highest in the world. Nigeria also has the highest infant mortality and maternal mortality in the world.
Nigeria has 133million multidimensionally poor people according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
In the midst of the deteriorating health system most of our best brains in the medical field are literally fleeing the country in search of greener pastures abroad, especially in United States, United Kingdom, Europe and the Gulf States among others. There is no sector that we have done very well. Unemployment rate is about 33 percent while inflation is over 23 percent. Our hospitals have remained ‘mere consulting clinics’ while our education system is in shambles. The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) recently called off eight months strike, even as threats of more strikes loom. In the past seven years over 53,000 Nigerians have been killed by terrorists, bandits, insurgents and armed herdsmen. The insecurity has created over 2million internally displaced persons (IDPs) in parts of the country.
In fact, life in Nigeria has become ‘short, brutish and nasty.’ And life expectancy has plummeted to the worst among developing countries, all thanks to poor health infrastructure in the country.
Voting for leaders because of religious and ethnic affinity has therefore done more harm than good to the country. Since voting along ethnic and religious lines has put this country in dire straits, the Saturday election should be devoid of such sentiments. This election should be about character, capacity and commitment to deliver the needed change in the country. The voters should take cursory look at the presidential candidates of the APC, PDP, LP and NNPP and weigh each of them in terms of character before they make their choice. Has the person been tainted by corruption and allegations of corruption?
There are tons of materials about the candidates in public space that contain corruption allegations trailing some of them that should guide the voters on who to vote for. There is also the issue of capacity.
The presidency of Nigeria requires mental and physical energy and should not be handed to anyone with failing mental or physical capacity. This much was explained recently by former President Olusegun Obasanjo who had been democratically elected president of Nigeria for eight years and is in a better position to know what it takes to be an effective president.
Nigeria’s problem is so enormous and threatening that the country cannot afford a president that will not be available on his duty post because he is nursing his health in foreign lands. That is why Nigerian voters should also take note of the uncertainty in the country when President Muhammadu Buhari spent months in hospital abroad and ensure they do not vote for any candidate that is likely to put the country in similar situation again in 2023.
Nigerians should vote for the candidates that have history of transparency in their antecedents and have not enriched themselves in their previous positions. There should not be doubts about any candidate’s origin, age and academic records. Any person with shady background should not be allowed near the precinct of the Aso Rock Villa.
The voters should note that at the root of Nigeria’s underdevelopment is corruption. Corruption has been endemic in both public and private sectors of the country. Nigeria has become a password for corruption around the world. Indeed, Nigeria is one of the ‘most fantastically corrupt countries in the world.’ The price of corruption in Nigeria had been under-development and excruciating poverty. Nigerian voters cannot afford to reinforce corruption by voting for a presidential candidate that will not fight corruption or pay lip service to the war against corruption. Voters should vote for the candidate that had campaigned to fight corruption and has record of transparency and accountability.
Let the voters on Saturday vote for a new Nigeria. Let’s vote for a Nigeria devoid of corruption and nepotism. Let us vote for character, capacity, commitment to deliver for the public good and transparency in governance. Say no to ethnic and religious bigotry on Saturday. A new Nigeria is possible with your votes.
Nigerians should vote and defend their votes. Every vote must count.
And for that to be possible the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) must conduct free, fair and transparent elections.
It must not only be neutral; INEC must also be seen to be neutral.
INEC must ensure that all its equipment for the election is fit for purpose and there will not be incidents of malfunctioning of Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) and other equipment on election day.
The security agents should ensure that there are no incidents of intimidation of voters in any part of the country, while vote buyers should be apprehended and dealt with according to the law. Nigerian voters have the opportunity to change the trajectory of the country in the next four years. That opportunity beckons on Saturday.
MAY NIGERIA REBOUND
