2023: Stakeholders Call for Incorruptible, Peaceful Elections in Nigeria

Blessing Ibunge in Port Harcourt

Stakeholders at a political enlightenment programme organised by a Non-Governmental Organisation, Unity House Foundation, in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, have called for a peaceful, fair, and corruption free election in the 2023 general poll.

The event, which was a civil engagement on election process in the state tagged, “Citizen Get Together”, had in attendance the Rivers standard flag bearers of Action Alliance, Dr.Dawari George and All Progressives  Congress(APC), Tonye Cole.

Speaking at the meeting, yesterday, Director General of Nigeria Institute of International Affairs, Professor Eghosa Osaghae,  noted that the fractured foundation of the Nigerian system, is the reason for electoral malpractice and bad leadership in the country.

Osaghae, who was the keynote speaker at the meeting, stressed that the consequences of the Nigerian political system, where there are grand corruption, massive rigging and bad leadership can be traced to a fractured foundation.

He said that politics have not evolved into improving society, while stressing  that the political system is an opportunistic system where both leaders and the led see it as a means to an end.

Osaghae insisted that until the citizens rise to the occasion of resetting the agenda for governance the status quo remains.

“Our system needs to address the whole management of the emergence of leaders. How we choose our leaders matters a lot. I have seen more aside things. One is we should take politicians for medical examination.

“Until we learn that what concerns all of us affects all of us and find a way of dealing with them, we are not likely to have the right approach even to elections in our country.

“But we have an opportunity in 2023 to reset the agenda for our country to make a contribution to the management of our fractured foundation so we can say that finally we are getting to a point where it is a connection between our democratic movement and our political-cultural movement, “ he said.

However, the convener of the stakeholders’ meeting, Wenenda Wali, emphasised that the country needed a system that engenders meritocracy, warning that if the country toes  the route which it is  on, the end might be destructive

He said: “The only way to move this country is to have a process that allows for the best to be able to come out and the people to decide. If we continue this route of anything goes and any kind of conduct is okay, this country will not move from where it is to where it wants to be.”

Also, the Chairman of the event, Prof. Eme Ekekwe, blamed electoral violence on lack of democratic culture.

He noted that the difference between democratic and military rulers is democratic culture.