Democracy is the rule of the people. It is so defined because it is the people that owns the sovereignty from whom every government derives its powers and authority. In Nigeria, democracy has been bastardised to the extent that power now proceeds from the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and from the courts. This untoward situation came to a head when Prof Yakubu Mahmood, National Chairman of INEC, suspended the electronic transmission of election results from the polling units into the INEC Result Viewing Portal (IREV Portal) for an alleged technical glitch which selected only the presidential election to glitch on while not glitching on the National Assembly legislative elections held on the same day and at the same time. At night Mahmood returned Tinubu as President to the chagrin of the whole world. He asked every embarrassed onlooker to go to court, thereby confirming that it’s either himself or the court that can determine winners of election, not the people.
This represents the greatest threat to our democracy because since then our democracy has been on a downward spiral. The Imo, Bayelsa, Kogi, Ondo, and Edo off-cycle gubernatorial elections ended shamefully in courts.
At least INEC is somehow still pretending that it holds elections. This pretence does not extend to the State Independent Electoral Commission (SIEC) which is constitutionally mandated to conduct elections into the local government councils. The governors, through the instrumentality of SIECs, select whosoever they want to become local government council chairmen and councillors. Unfortunately, they still waste the state’s resources to pretentiously organise so-called elections that will produce only their anointed and chosen candidates.
A dangerous angle has now been introduced to the issue of local government elections. Prior to the Supreme Court decisions which held that Federal Government can transmit local government funds directly to the local government councils, and that governors do not have the power to dissolve local government councils, governors remove the elected local council members at will and replace them with Caretaker Committees. As the momentum gains ground, governors, who in their tenures, refused to organise local government council elections, hurriedly organise any sham local government elections when, either they were defeated in their bid for a second term, or they lost the opportunity to have their successor installed as governor after them. This was what happened in Osun and other states.
Gov Adegboyega Oyetola, believed to be the nephew of President Tinubu, according to Governor Adeleke of Osun State, lost his bid for a second term to be the Governor of Osun State. He hurriedly organised local government council elections to install his supporters on the local councils during the tenure of Governor Adeleke. This is despite the fact that he governed the state throughout without conducting any local government elections. Adeleke’s men resisted this move and removed these emergency elected local government council members. Two parties challenged the action in court, PDP and APP. Oyetola lost at the High Courts, but succeeded partially at the Court of Appeal. He lost to the APP but won partially against the PDP. In this judicial uncertainty, no side, especially Oyetola’s side can claim absolute judicial victory.
A country where rule of law prevails would have waited to hear the final verdict of the Supreme Court, the highest court of the land, before taking over the local government secretariats. But this was not to be as APC-led thugs with the assistance of the security agencies allegedly stormed all the local government council secretariats to forcefully take them over on the 17th of February, 2025. In their bid to enforce that one former local government chairman, and six others were killed. Several other people were injured.
The sad part of this unfortunate incident is that Governor Adeleke raised alarm, one day before on the possible breakdown of law and order according to an intelligence report that Oyetola was trying to forcefully take over the local government secretariats. He appealed to the security agencies to take adequate measures to prevent the occurrence. Yet nothing happened. This reminds me of Rivers State where the Inspector-General of Police refused to provide security for the local government council elections on the excuse that a court said the police should not participate in the election. Some local government secretariats were burnt down because of this dereliction of duty. I asked the question then, was the police meant to participate in the election in the first place? Is the police a political organisation? The court never said the police should not maintain law and order, and should never say so. The police is under a duty not to be partisan, but is under a duty to maintain law and order and ensure there’s no breakdown of law and order.
What happened in Osun is purely a coup. I agree completely with the Attorney General of the Federation that any governor who dissolves a duly elected local government council and replaces it with a Caretaker Committee has committed treasonable felony because the governor has run foul of section 1(2) of the 1999 Constitution. However, any local government council which emanated from a rigged, illegal, or unconstitutional manner should not benefit from such protection until there’s a final declaration by the courts.
As a lawyer, I am aware that there’s a procedure for the enforcement of court orders which do not include using thugs to forcefully overwhelm opponents and forcefully take over power. This was the same tactic that military forces used to take over government. If you get a judgement from a court and the defendants refuse to comply with the judgement, you go back to the court and apply for the enforcement of the judgement. The police will now be instructed to assist you to enforce the judgement and the court can throw the defendants to jail for contempt of court. This implies that the police, under Egbetokun, has failed again in the preservation of law and order in Osun State despite being forewarned by the Chief Law Officer of the state. One can imagine the possible war that the Osun State gubernatorial off-cycle election, which will be contested, most probably, by the two political gladiators, Adeleke and Oyetola, will be if necessary precautions are not taken now to avert it. I use this opportunity to plead with the IGP to commence preparations henceforth to ensure peaceful transfer of power in a free and fair manner in the 2026 off-cycle Osun State gubernatorial election. In all of this, it’s our democracy that is under threat of extinction.
Another unfortunate incident which may stress our democracy is the unconscionable interference with the activities of the Lagos State House of Assembly (LSHOA) for doing one of the simplest jobs of the Assembly – choosing one of them to lead them, and removing him for good, bad, or no reason at all. Section 92(1)(2)(c) is very clear that “There shall be a Speaker and a Deputy Speaker of a House of Assembly who shall be elected by the members of the House from among themselves.” and that “The Speaker or Deputy Speaker of the House of Assembly shall vacate his office if he is removed from office by a resolution of House of Assembly by the votes of not less than two-third majority of the members of the House.”
The former Speaker of the LSHOA, Hon Mudashiru Obasa, was unanimously removed as Speaker of the LSHOA by practically all the members of the LSHOA. On his coming back from his holidays, he actually declared that he is still the Speaker. How? It is really unfortunate that the LSHOA has not been allowed to peacefully conduct its legislative business since then. The most embarrassing incident being the forceful barricade of the LSHOA by security agencies to prevent the current Speaker, Hon Mojisola Meranda from going in to conduct the business of the Assembly. The members had to forcefully break into the chamber and conducted the business of the House which was to uphold a vote of confidence on the current Speaker. The Assembly is adjourned sine dine as I write.
The reason for the security barricade was that the former Speaker threatened to come back and conduct the business of the House. If the former Speaker made such threat, this would not warrant barricading the House. The security agencies should just arrest him immediately he appears within the LSHOA as Speaker and charge him to court for a coup and send him to jail for desecrating section 1(2) of the 1999 Constitution. The firm stand of the members of the LSHOA on this matter is commendable. If there’s any godfather anywhere fueling the crisis in the House, the godfather should desist because every republic that has been destroyed in Nigeria commenced its destruction through violence from the South-West. The absence of rule of law is the presence of anarchy. Until the system is returned to what it should be, we will wake up one day and discover that a full blown dictatorship has taken over the country once more.