Mariam Mariam
The 2007 state and federal elections fell short of basic international and regional standards for democratic elections. They were marred by very poor organization, lack of essential transparency, widespread procedural not irregularities, substantial evidence of fraud, widespread Voter disenfranchisement at different stages of the process, lack of equal conditions for political parties and candidates and numerous incidents of violence. As a result, the process cannot be considered to have been credible. Given the lack of transparency and evidence of fraud, particularly in the results collation process there can be no confidence in the results of these elections”-The European Union.
A few days before the European Union’s report elections was released, Professor Maurice Iwu, the chief steward of the most fraudulent elections in Nigeria’s history, went on the offensive. He told the European Union election observers that Nigeria was a sovereign country which needed no lessons on how to conduct its elections. It’s has true that jingoism becomes the final refuge of scoundrels of all hues, including those who preside a over the massive rigging of elections at the behest of disgraced former President Olusegun Obasanjo, and in cahoots with the PDP apparatus, and the security forces.
Mister Maurice lwu has always stayed on the offensive believing that attack remains the best form of defense a few weeks ago, he bought pages upon pages in several Nigerian newspapers to beat his hollow chest again, about how he saved Nigeria by the manner that he conducted the 2007 elections.
Apparently, the man needs to continue to convince himself that he did the right thing even when the whole world including the president that emerged from the process had been spectacularly flawed and the Nigerian people were victims of a serial rape in the hands of the PDP, with Professor Maurice Iwu holding the legs of the victims to facilitate the rape!
Prof Maurice according to various informed sources, had been single-handedly chosen for the job at INEC Nnamdi ‘Andy’ Uba to facilitate a few jobs; -these were to ensure that ‘Andy’ Uba became the governor of Anambra State, no matter what! because it was imperative in the loyalty to Obasanjo while the despot held sway has been in calculations of ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo to procure the immunity for’ Andy’ Uba. They could not leave anything to chance given the place that he occupied in the eight years of the controversies which characterized the Obasanjo administration. The other function was to preside over the massively fraudulent elections which the European Union’s report has once again exposed as the charade and tragic fraud that we all know it was.
Well, for the man without the humility to accept responsibility for the lack of legitimacy of the regime which his elections produced, Maurice lwu has continued to live in his own universe of self-deceit and an exaggerated series of self-worth about what he had done for the Nigerian nation last April. Mr. Maurice lwu will sooner rather than later discover that the soap bubble will burst and he will have to account to the Nigerian people about the serial rape of our electoral sovereignty that he facilitated including those incredible last minute contracts awarded which clearly played no role in the electoral process eventually.
If Professor Maurice Iwu continues to live in denial, should not surprise us at all; even former President Obasanjo finds it difficult to accept that he is completely hated by the Nigerian people for the suffering that he inflicted on them over eight years while he and his cronies were transferring the nation’s assets to themselves. He is in utter shock that his delusions of being described as “the founder modem Nigeria” is fast exploding in his face, and like the Emperor in the story, his ugly and unsightly nakedness is now the talk of the town. That is why the man is now telling the whole world that he does not read newspapers. Obasanjo’s universe has continued to shrink; he is not given, any acclaim by other world leaders as we saw during the recently launched Mandela Initiative; the man has stepped on all the toes that mattered at home over the past eight years and he has also lost a national constituency. That is what happens to those who refuse to learn the lessons of history.
But it is not only Professor Maurice lwu and Obasanjo who live in self-deceit; Nnamdi ‘Andy’ Uba is in court to vacate the verdict of the Supreme Court that he is an “ex-governor”. Although he is reported to be hopeful that he might get back to reckoning in Anambra State, the truth is that the loop is tightening everyday around that pretender. The Obasanjo umbrella, under which they were doing to Nigeria the unimaginable things, as if eight years would not expire, has now torn into pieces. They are in crisis because they did not learn the lessons history, which are essential for successful career in politics.
Those who refuse to learn the vital lessons of the historical process are a danger to society’s health, this much we have seen in the eight years of Obasanjo. That danger has not abated because Obasanjo made a determined effort to ensure that Nigerian evolution in politics was held in tight reign by him. He imposed all kinds of candidates for manners of position in Nigeria with utmost contempt for the Nigerian people. One of his impositions was Patricia Olubunmi Etteh as the speaker of the House Representatives.
I think Doctor Okey Ndibe got it right in his column in the DAILY SUN of Tuesday, August 28, 2007, when he said of Madam Speaker that “Part of the trouble lay – to state it euphemistically – in her humble education and in her antecedents as a hairdresser.
With careful grooming, guidance and astute effort, anybody could rise to the challenges of law making. But to jump from hairdresser to speaker? That seemed a stretch. She may have been at the top of the hairdressing game, but did she have what it took to pilot the country’s legislative business?”
Well, the woman whose only claim to fame was a fierce loyal to Obasanjo while the depot held sway has been in the news in the past week or two, thanks to the brilliant work of investigative journalism by our newspapers. She has been, reported to have approved the sum of N628 million to renovate her residence and that of her deputy. After a while, her supporters came out to state that ONLY N238 million was spent on the residence of Madam Speaker along with the procurement of choice vehicles for her use. But not to be outdone in the Nigerian penchant for vanity, especially at the to accept top of the political pile, the madam was in Washington to celebrate her birthday, ostensibly to announce her ‘arrival on the world stage’ in the dream-like transition from the lowly life to the number four person in the country of over one hundred and forty million people!
I think Doctor Okey Ndibe’s assessment is very apt in respect of the woman’s record “Etteh’s leadership of ‘the lower chamber has been inept. She has gone out of her way to stave off legitimate attempts to probe how her mentor, Obasanjo, disposed of certain national assets in the dying hours of his administration. She has otherwise not chalked up any impressive legislative agenda. If she has a menu of bills targeted at addressing the nation’s myriad crises, she has done an excellent job of keeping it secret. Her inability to push any legislative initiative with the potential of bettering the lot of Nigerians cannot possibly make her an icon of Nigerian women. But if legislative ineptitude were Etteh’s only deficit, .it might be readily forgiven her. But ineptitude compounded with greed is a lethal combo in any public official, the man or woman”.
If it was not to show his contempt for the Nigerian people, why would Obasanjo have imposed such a frankly inadequate woman (with no disrespect intended) as the speaker of our parliament!
Of course it will not surprise anybody, if at the end of the day; Madam Speaker is given a clean bill of health by her colleagues under pressure from the apparatchik of the political party in power. This is because like a scandal or abuse of privilege, politicians believe more in spirit the corps than in fostering the public good. Already, the media has been reporting about the efforts of the PDP to save her, because no member of the party is expected to go against its interest, as if it is its interest to condone the abuse of public funds.
For me the star political event of the outgoing week must be the announcement any subsequent inauguration of the electoral reform committee which is headed by the former Chief Justice, Muhammad Lawal Uwais. When President Umaru Musa Yar’ Adua held a breakfast meeting with us two weeks ago, he had hinted us that the members of the committee would be individuals who had the reputation” to protect and indeed that is what it has done. Looking through the list, one can agree that these were very remarkable individuals, whose pedigree can be vouched for and who might help to look the electoral process in the face, in a matter of speaking to help turn a new leaf.
It is a part of the contradiction in the Yar’Adua presidency that it has continued to take steps the Nigerian people can applaud even when it is mired in its own crisis of illegitimacy.
But it is not unusual in history to play a very useful role in the nation-building process from the stand point of the legitimacy challenge such as President Umaru Yar’ Adua continues to face three months after entering the precincts of Aso villa. If ever there was an individual on that list though that I felt carried a question mark given the issue he was to work on of electoral reforms that individual must be the managing director New Nigerian Newspaper Mister Ndanusa Alao. This is because he represents the media in the committee, and I remember he was the only newspaper that I remember wrote an editorial endorsing the elections of April 2007. If the elections had been very acceptable to him, what then will he be helping reform?
Of course these are early days yet, but the background of the rejection of an electoral reform initiative by very important political constituencies also points out how deep seated the rot is, and how aggrieved Nigerians are about the way former president Obasanjo, Professor Maurice Iwu ,the PDP and the security forces/thugs alliance had worked together last year to deny the people the opportunity to make legitimate choice of those who rule our country.
If however that electoral team is able to do a thorough job to unravel the processes which led to fraudulent elections: the undemocratic party, the fraud associated with the nomination of candidates, the appointment of electoral officials, the funding of electoral body, the role of the security forces, the winner take- all syndrome, just to name a few, we might discover that a very significant contribution would have been made to the development of the democratic process in our country. It is such a shame that decades after we begun to hold elections in Nigeria, we would still be discussing the basic steps of achieving an electoral process whose outcome will reflect the true choice of the Nigerian electorate. War-torn sierra Leone also recently held the first round of elections, and the fact that the opposition won that first round and its victory was not overturned shows that whatever the eventual outcome, the electoral process has been accepted as the legitimate route to bring about change in the political system of that nation.
Unfortunately, that is the process we have been denied in Nigeria, with dire consequence for the political system and the legitimacy of the Nigerian state itself. As was noticed by the inspector general of policein our piece on this page last week, the fraudulent electoral process which ex- president Obasanjo and his PDP apparatus have imposed on Nigeria since 2003 has been the harbinger of the deadly violence which the nation is mired in today. So the act of electoral fraud has sown very dangerous seeds whose outcome now threaten to engulf the nation while denying the political elite the legitimacy of power.
Yes, they occupy the government spend all the monies, control the apparatus of power, move around in convoys guarded by security me, etc. but they do not command the respect of the people, they live in mortal fear of tomorrow and they carry a legitimacy burden! That is what a fraudulent electoral system does to the political process in a country. This the background against which President Umaru Yar’Adua has operated from, which obliged him to set up his electoral reform panel. No one can dispute the good intentions of mister president, but it will also be very difficult to envy him too, caught as he is within the certainties of his own intentions and the process.
