Femi Hamzat: Next Election May Be Worse Unless…

•Says Nigerians expect perfect elections in imperfect situations

Dike Onwuamaeze

The Lagos State Deputy Governor, Dr. Obafemi Hamzat, has said subsequent elections might be worse than the ones being contested because the Nigerian people were not addressing the real issues yet.

He also snickered at Nigerians who were expecting perfect elections in an imperfect situation, but ended up blaming their unfulfilled expectations on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the judiciary.

Hamzat, who stated this yesterday during the opening ceremony of a two-day retreat on “Nigeria Open Political Party (NOPP) Project: Capacity Strengthening Retreat for National Youth Leaders of Political Parties in Nigeria,” organised by the Westminster Foundation for Democracy (WFD) in Eko Hotel, Lagos, enjoined the people to change their mindset and focus on the real challenges militating against the country’s electoral processes.

“The challenge that we all need to look at is the way we have weaponised everything in our country. I have listened to many public commentators abuse INEC, abuse judiciary, abuse everybody.

“The truth is that we are doing damage to ourselves. And I pray that your generation will change it. So, let us pity the INEC. For me, they have done a great job. But everyone has maligned them. People will be scared to take that position (INEC’s responsibility),” he said.  

He told the national youth leaders of political parties that Nigerians, who cried that INEC failed to transfer election’s results to its IREV were only blaming the country’s infrastructure deficits on the electoral commission.

He said, “When we said INEC did not transfer results immediately to IREV, let me ask: can they do it? Have you seen the broadband chart of Nigeria? There are ballot boxes in areas that do not have network. How do they transfer these results? So, we are blaming INEC for the inefficiency of our infrastructure.

“The problem is that we want a perfect election in an imperfect situation and we will blame INEC. It is not possible. The problem is that we demean our institutions. And we cannot build a nation like that.

“The challenge is because of the way that we are commenting. We are commenting on the wrong things. Therefore, my fear is that our election will be getting worse. The next one will probably be the worst because we are not talking about the real issues,” the deputy governor said.

He, therefore, said there was nothing surprising about electoral violence in the country because Nigerians were accustomed to fighting in their normal day lives.