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•Conduct of 2023 elections will affect future elections
Former President of the Igbo think tank group, Aka Ikenga, Chief Goddy Uwazurike, has warned that ethnic profiling may set Nigeria ablaze.
In an interview with VINCENT KALU, the president of the Cultural Credibility and Development Initiative (CCDI), noted that the conduct of the 2023 general elections will affect future elections in this country
What is your assessment of the 2023 general election?
My assessment is the same as the European Union Commission; my assessment is in line with all men of reason. There was massive intimidation, there was massive deprivation of the right to vote, there was massive destruction of votes, polling booths, voters cards, and there was also massive rigging.
There was even apathy because most people felt disappointed that the result of the presidential election didn’t tally with all the efforts they put into it and they went away disappointed and those who turned up suffered for it – broken heads, dead bodies, injuries.
Right now, one of the leaders of one of the satellite Igbo community towns in Lagos is languishing in Panti,Yaba. What was his offence? He came out on that day of election, and other Igbo living near joined him and the political thugs in their numbers came out and said: ‘Igbo should all leave, we don’t want you to vote.’ Before they knew it, these thugs descended on them. This man ran to the Oba’s palace for safety, and the Oba quickly called the police and he was picked up and the police have paraded him for ballot snatching, when where he and others were attacked was not near any polling centre. With this, other Igbo potential voters scattered. That man is still in Panti till today. Panti is a dreaded place where you keep murderers and other hardened criminals. What is his offence? Just to vote. The suppression of voters was actually done openly. The police are supposed to maintain law and order, but definitely not in Lagos. What is this ethnic profiling going on? There was no Igbo man on the ballot paper, and the offence is that we are supporting Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour. In 2019, the offence was that why should Jim Agbaje come out. In 2015, the Oba was there threatening to drown the Igbo in the lagoon for supporting Agbaje. I really don’t understand this reasoning. On various platforms, you always have one person encouraging the lay-abouts to attack the Igbo people. On that election day, it was rampant and because of that we had funny, funny results. There was no election; what we had was selection.
Could it be that the presidential election took many of the political actors unawares? In the states where the opposition parties did well, they were not given any chance in the governorship election?
I agree with you. For example, the Labour Party took people by surprise and reason was very simple. Many of the young men and the young at heart actually believed in Peter Obi and they call themselves the Obidients, and most of them were not members of the Labour Party, but they were looking for somebody who would set Nigeria free out of this quagmire of this crisis and the economy. So they believe in him and so they trooped out.
Remember, LP has no governor right now. In other words, it has no state governor funding the party, Peter Obi was doing it and in some cases, they were denying him landing right. People came out to vote because they believe in the man and not necessarily in the party and that took everybody by surprise because they saw him as nothing, a non-starter and that the party has no structure. The young people and the young at heart will tell you that Peter Obi won the election, and they felt disappointed to come and vote; they said for what would they come out again to vote?
LP is not well known, they didn’t have candidates all over, and so having lost the chance to elect Peter Obi, they moved away. So that left the LP as a party that has to struggle. That struggle means that you have a governorship candidate who is there with you and that was the case with Nasarawa, Plateau, Benue and Ebonyi that has no candidate. The LP structure was weak because they didn’t have candidates all over. Most of them who voted for LP did it because it was Peter Obi. Labour Party didn’t have that knowledge of how to rig election or how to prevent election because for you to prevent rigging, you must know how to rig. The Obidients actually were simple-minded people who believe in justice; who believe that, yes is yes and no is no. They didn’t know that the established vanguard in power; those who are used to doing things their own way would not allow the young to come in. That is exactly what happened. So, the first election took everybody by surprise and for the second election, they came out to say we know what you want to do and we will not allow it and we know what the result will be.
To the best of my knowledge, for threatening Igbo, for violence and rigging, snatching boxes and for the governor to have spoken yesterday about the ethnic profiling and violence show a lot because the Igbo people in Lagos led by the Ohanaeze in the state supported the governor and wanted him back. But now, everybody, who is not of Yoruba origin is being profiled and threatened, including the Ohanaeze Ndigbo in Lagos. In Lagos parlance, if you are not a Yoruba, you are Igbo; Musa from Kano is Igbo, Omoruiyi from Edo is Igbo, Tiv man is Igbo and that is the way it is, which is wrong.
Are you satisfied with the conducts of the security agencies during the elections?
I cannot give a straight forward answer. It was either they were complicit or they were sleeping. They were never there to protect voters; they were never there to stop thugs from beating voters. The beating was in their presence, the violence was in their presence, but you see the police commissioner coming out to say that there was no violence. I began to wonder why he said there was no violence in Lagos, and he issued a press statement even when the television was showing scenes of violence. And with a straight face, he said there was no violence.
Where and when did INEC miss it?
Eight years ago, a man was appointed as the INEC chairman, after Jega, and we thought that he would learn on the job. Forgiving him for the mistakes of 2019 cannot be the same thing of forgiving him for the mistakes of 2023. For God’s sake this is a professor, and a lot of money was at his disposal and time to make amends. And yet, it was bungled.
This post election rigmarole is what I don’t understand. How can INEC refuse to give Peter Obi the certified true copies of their documents? The chairman is not a candidate, he is only a middleman; his job is to give out the documents once requested. Now Peter Obi has gone to court with what he has. Who do you want to blame, me or INEC? It is INEC definitely. Festus Okoye of the INEC was very effusive in promising us free and fair election, and that the votes should count and transmitted after voting from the polling units, but now people are disappointed.
Over 80 million people collected their PVCs, but less than 27 million people voted. Does that not show there was voter apathy?
Let me tell you about the collection of the PVCs. Remember that Pat Utomi addressed a press conference over the most notorious collection centre at Oshodi. The Resident Electoral Commissioner, Agbaje, instead of saying, yes, we will speed up the process, he said, ‘it is the migrants that registered there’, that is ethnic slur; ethnic profiling, and he justified that by not giving them their PVCs. In the end, the people never got their PVCs. To the shock of everybody, a huge pile of PVCs was discovered on the road in Ago Palace way, and people were trooping there to go and see if their cards were there.
Remember that INEC has four years to prepare, and on the election day, people’s names were on the list of voters, but without the PVC they couldn’t be allowed to vote. I witnessed it. Those who managed to vote, their votes didn’t count. Those who wanted to collect their PVCs didn’t collect. So, everything was a failure and the worst case remains Lagos. Agbaje owes an apology. Remember it was Agbaje who was anxious to use the vehicles of the man called MC Oluomo for the logistics. It took a court action to stop him. This was the same man who went to Aguda and was recorded threatening Igbo people. Yet that was supposed to be part of the election, Agbaje remains part of the problem of INEC.
How can ethnic profiling be addressed?
It is difficult if somebody like Bayo Onanuga, who visited Rwanda in 2018 and condemned ethnic profiling and ethnic hatred and wept as man’s inhumanity to man, is one of those carrying the flag of ethnic profiling, justifying it and saying that he has no apology and he would not withdraw his statement on targeting of Ndigbo. If gold rusts, what will iron do? The governor who spoke after the result came out not before shows a conspiracy against Ndigbo is there. The leg men are the ones you see running around and the brain and those who bought the guns, the knives and the Indian hemp, and are in their various offices. Ethnic profiling will set Nigeria on fire.
Can the experience and disappointment of voters affect the turnout of future elections?
People like Peter Obi do not appear in every election. He was a rare character and the young and the young at heart saw his hands to put this country on a steady base. Then you have people like Femi Fani Kayode, who have half Igbo and half Yoruba children abusing you for being Igbo, and you expect people to come out again to vote. It is difficult to convince any voter today to come and vote in future. Probably, those who would turn 18 by next election can come out, but most of the people who witnessed what happened this year may not be eager to come out, unless a realistic chairman of INEC comes in, makes amend, apologises and shows encouragement that disenfranchisement would never happen again. Right now, there is little hope.
People are told that the PVCs were the way to remove bad or unwanted government, but you’re saying that there is little hope. What is the option available?
Where is the PVC? Those who came to collect their PVCs were abused by the Resident Electoral Commissioner in Lagos. Those who voted, their votes didn’t count and those who are supposed to make sure that the votes actually counted are on the side of the riggers. So, the real voters are in the minority right now, while the riggers are in the majority because they have the instruments of power and instruments of cohesion. Those who have succeeded in rigging this election have one motto, which is victory first and morality later. It is something I say with tears in my eyes. That is the tragedy of the Nigeria’s election.
Then, where do we go from here?
I don’t know. We have a man like Jonathan, who was fair to all concerned. They conspired and made sure that he was out. Having done that, we lost our economy, we lost our right to choose our leaders and we lost even our right to have money. Right now the Nigeria economy is not even on one leg but flat on its back waiting for redemption.
