Maurice Iwu: To go or not with Electoral commissioners
By Greg Okechukwu-Nwadike
Recently, the topic is on whether the chairman of the independent National Electoral Commission, Professor Maurice Iwu should be sacked from office or should be allowed to continue and round off his tenure which hopefully ends soon.
While a cross section of “short memory Nigerians” wants the erudite Prof booted out of office, others who were simply accused of “benefitting from his rigging sprees” want the INEC boss to continue and possibly conduct the next general elections in the country.
While I would not attempt to deny Nigerians their constitutional right of expressions in their discourse of relevant national issues, my simple questions and argument would be: why is it easier for Nigerians to destroy than to build?
Why do we find it easier to criticize than to praise? Why is it that since the past two decades, Nigeria has not recorded “our heroes past” as recited in our national anthem; rather all Nigerians who had served this country meritoriously are tagged criminals at the end of their service and possibly their heads recommended for the slaughter house?
My view therefore is that time is here when we begin to see the good side of our leaders more than their flaws. It’s high time we started preaching patriotism both for our country, our elected leaders and generations unborn.
On the claims by some people that some countries have got it right but Nigeria cannot; let me attempt a response to this with America. America got her independence on 4th July, 1776 (that is about 233 years ago). America has practiced democracy for more than 100 years. America has conducted elections for 230 years having held its first presidential elections in 1779.
In all these while, true Americans believe they are still learning from their mistakes and are daily perfecting on their electioneering mechanisms. The case of the former President Bush’s second tenure contest with John Kerry of the Democrats in 2004 and the State of Florida results controversies still presents its self before us. But Americans did not call it rigging.
Some Nigerians even want Ghana to come and conduct elections for us. For God sake that is a very big insult. Ghana itself has not claimed perfection even though it has an incomparable smaller size with Nigeria yet it still has its own flaws.
In both countries, there were times when they were still battling with the establishment of their democracies and even at that it cost them the losses of their own people. In their efforts, America recorded one of the worst revolutions in the world. Firearms were at sometimes used freely among their legislators even in their chambers while some of their Presidents were shot and killed in broad day lights.
Former President Jerry Rawlings of Ghana led a revolution that sent most of the country’s top military officers-turned-politicians to their graves. All were in efforts to enshrine solid and uninterrupted democratic channels in their respective countries and today we can boldly give a rousing ovation to their success stories.
While I am not trying to instigate revolution in the country or defend the abuse of official privileges by some Nigerians placed in positions of authority, I am however not ignorant of the fact that a good thing does not just come easy. It always goes with prize.
When the phrase “short memories” was used earlier, it simply meant the way Nigerians quickly forget history. I have reviewed the reasons why some people want Iwu sacked and what I discovered showed how quick we forgot our past and the total ignorance of some of us on the processes of building democracy.
For one thing I know, Nigeria wouldn’t have broken the spell of its inability to transit from one democracy to another if not with somebody like Iwu being there and handling the situation because this country is a very complex one. Many of the National Electoral bosses who tried it in the past failed woefully. Rather than transiting the country into the next democratic rule, their efforts only brought us back to another military rule. Check the history.
Have we asked ourselves why in our 48 years as a sovereign nation we were only able to transit for the first time in 2003 from civilian to civilian without war, tension, protests and eventual military take over? Have we asked ourselves the reason why all previous attempts had always proved abortive?
Nigeria is a very complex state with some mighty people always wishing for crisis during transition periods so that their military friends could come. This had always caused the country a step forward and three backward.
This is where I must commend Professor Maurice Iwu. This is why I believe that heroes are the people who do what has to be done when it needs to be done, regardless of consequences.
Despite the frustrations that confronted him at first by funds not being released on time; the political crisis and disagreements from the party levels; the various court injunctions, rulings and counter rulings; the attempts by “mighty men” to ensure that the elections was postponed, this man stood his ground and ensured that we had a smooth and successful transition for the first time in the history of this country.
Some persons in Iwu’s position would have compromised to plunge the country into worse anarchy and allowed the military to once again take over power and commence another maradona-like-election-time table as had been the custom.
Yes, the outcome might be dirty or riggings may have taken place which the INEC boss has never denied but that is the prize for our building a solid democratic and enduring democratic foundation for the future. Because of the military incursions into the Nigerian politics in the past, this game in the country had become dirty and you don’t expect to pack them without soiling your hands.
My point is that Iwu might not be a hero; he might not be the best and may not have given the best to this country but he has started something which the judiciary, being another mechanism of government is now relying on in crafting new democratic policies.
Elections do not just end after the casting of votes and swearing in of perceived winners. No! Electioneering continues until the various courts and tribunals are dispensed of all the elections cases before them, thus a successful election is not just the making of INEC alone. It involves every mechanism of government, including you and me.
If we are truly serious to develop our democracy, then it is better that things happened the way they happened and the courts are now systematically correcting them rather than that Nigeria should be plunged once again into a military administration or an interim rule
And still on election riggings permit me to ask these questions: Who are the people that rig these elections; is it not you and me? Can the INEC boss be in all the states at the same period to monitor elections? Why then must we have INEC State Resident Officers if the INEC boss at the federal level would not trust or believe the results they send to him?
Whoever that is the INEC boss relies solely on results posted to him from state levels by his Resident Electoral Officers to issue certificates of return to winners because he cannot be in all the states and this goes to show that whatever rigging that takes place in the state comes from the people there and I don’t see how that would warrant for the removal of the person who announced the result.
My humble submission therefore is that the call for Professor Maurice Iwu’s removal would be morally unjust, unpatriotic, subjective and unfair if implemented without equally sacking all the 36 state’s federal resident electoral commissioners and other INEC officials who were involved in the alleged rigging of the 2007 general elections.
Greg Okechukwu-Nwadike is a media practitioner based in Abuja.
Greg Okey Nwadike
Discovery News Nigeria
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