Yesterday, I went out to vote in the regional election where I’m living at the moment. The election was held on Wednesday – a work day. Scheduled to start from 7.30 am to 9.00 pm. It’s to enable people to go to the nearest polling stations within their neighbourhoods to vote on the way to work or during their break period at work or to do so when they come back from work. I left my house at exactly 8:15 pm to go cast my vote. I went to the polling station, stayed in line to be accredited, voted and left the polling station at exactly 8:34 pm. The entire process was routinely quiet, pleasant, orderly and convenient. There were no party representatives nor uniformed security agents present in polling stations to monitor the voting – it was not necessary. The election ended at 9.00 pm as scheduled and before 11.00 pm the results of the entire election across the country were already being celebrated by winning political parties and their supporters. Contrast this experience with what happened on the 25th of February in Nigeria.

One of the core problems in Nigeria is the issue of collective non-citizenship in Nigeria. The Nigerian State does not consider us as citizens – real citizens of a country. This is an election where we ‘the people’ are expected to confer our mandate to any candidate of our choice in exercising our rights as citizens of Nigeria. The idea that few individuals would conspire to rig national elections and truncate our preferred mandate with the tacit support of critical machinery of the State, its agents and rented criminal thugs is a clear indication that we are not seen as citizens, whose voice should count in a democratic election as held in Nigeria. The affront of state capture as expressed in the brazen hijack of our elections and the electoral process by corrupt political elites directly repudiates any notion of citizenship rights and privileges in our country Nigeria.

Nigeria is a country where the absurd is normalised. Where are politicians can on national television freely boost of having personally delivered their local government, their constituency, and State to a political party in the charade we call “election.” We have implicitly normalised all forms of electoral malpractice, fraud, rigging, ballot snatching, violence and intimidation of opponents and electors.

How is it that 63 years after Independence, the Nigerian state is not yet culpable of conducting a free and fair election in the country? How come the BVAS could not upload election results from the polling stations on election Day as required by law, as promised by INEC and as expected by all Nigerians? How come?
After the failure of the electronic card readers in the early 2019 charade election. Great effort was made by the civil societies to push through a new electoral reform Act 2022. It introduced amongst other things the use of Bimodal Voting Accreditation Systems (BVAS) to aid our elections. BVAS was supposed to deliver two major benefits towards enhancing trust and ensuring transparency in the voting process.
a) It was supposed to resolve the problem of over-voting in polling stations given that the respective BVAS machine(s) deployed to each polling station can only accredit voters based on the official INEC voter registration data for the respective polling stations preconfigured in the respective BVAS machine in use.

b) It was also supposed to solve the crime of behind-the-door manipulation of election results that is all too common in Nigeria, given that the publicly counted and confirmed results from each polling station would be electronically transmitted to the INEC’s IREV online platform that is accessible to the public. So that everybody can see the polling station’s certified election results as they come in in real-time. Thus, negating the opportunity for behind the scene after-voting manipulation of results.

In other words, the credibility of the Nigerian election results was directly hinged on the BVAS performance. And before the elections, we were consistently reassured by INEC’s introduction of BVAS in our electoral process is a game changer, that was expected to usher in a new era of credible elections, thus advancing democracy in Nigeria. Besides, we were reassured that the BVAS has been properly test-runed to satisfaction in off-season elections in such places as Abuja, Edo State, Ekiti State, Anambra State, Osun State etc.

So, why was it that the BVAS could not upload the results of the elections from the polling stations in real time as promised? It was widely reported that most polling officers could not upload their respective election results to the INEC server. Many discovered that they were given the wrong passcode and could not upload their results while some claimed that they were explicitly instructed not to do so. In some cases, the BVAS in use were able to upload the senatorial and House of Representatives election results but suspiciously could not upload the presidential election result. Sadly, INEC merely told Nigerians that they experience a technical ‘glitch’ whatever that means. Up to now, INEC has made no effort whatsoever to explain to Nigerians – what happened simply because we are not considered as citizens that have the right to know what went wrong in the most expensive election ever conducted in the country costing over 400 billion Naira. Even now that I am writing this piece three weeks after the election, INEC has still not uploaded the results from all the polling stations on their IREV portal for all to see – results that were supposed to have been uploaded from the polling stations in real-time on the day of the elections. There is no denying that something is very wrong with INEC and its handling of election results.

It is not a stretch to conclude that this technical glitch was deliberately orchestrated. Many keen observers have suspected that the feeble claim of technical glitch by INEC is merely a ruse designed to allow the same old corrupt politicians the opportunity to manipulate the results of the election after all in addition to the usual very late arrival of materials, extensive voter disenfranchisement due to absence of voting materials and officials to conduct the elections, the perennial wide-spread incidence of under-age voters especially in the Northern parts of the country, ballot snatching, violence and intimidation of opponents and voters during the election. It is also noteworthy that the February 28th election elicited widespread criticisms from election monitors and observers including even the International Observers that are usually reticent in criticising elections in Nigeria in the past.

Despite all these glaring misgivings, widespread protests of Nigerians, robust opposition party’s complaints and appeals to INEC to review observed discrepancies in the collation of results, INEC ignored all the protestations to announce Bola Tinubu of APC as president-elect 4 days after the conduct of election to the utter disappointment of the supporters of the most popular candidate of the Labour Party – Peter Obi that is inspiring the growing movement for a new Nigeria. He was favoured by numerous polls before the election as the most likely candidate to win and there is a widespread belief that he is the actual winner of the election. Apart from the APC, all the major political parties that participated in the election have rejected the election. In response, INEC conveniently advised all aggrieved parties to seek remedy in the appropriate law courts. What wonderful advice indeed given the low credibility of our judicial system which is increasingly notorious for strange and bizarre court decisions. These parties which include the Labour Party (LP), Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) are respectively challenging the election results in the laws courts. This sort of election charade can only happen because we are not real citizens of Nigeria.

Nigeria has stolen our citizenship that is why politicians can steal our votes and our hope. Therefore, the question is what do we do about it? That is the real question – what are we going to do about it? I sincerely hope that we can find a common voice to say no, especially with the rising hunger for a new Nigeria as shown by so many in recent times. May the emergent mass movement for a new Nigeria grow to become the dominant force in our country able to redirect the country into a new path towards much-needed social change. We must say no to this charade we call ‘election’, no to the brigandage, no to the rascality. We must totally reject impunity. The struggle for a new Nigeria demands nothing less because it is the struggle for our right to be citizens in our own country.

– Dr. Okey Ndubueze