Here we go!

By the time this article is published, the governorship and state assembly elections would have been held. Perhaps also, results would have started trickling in with winners and losers emerging in some instances.

So also is the overall picture of the actual conduct of the polls. In this wise, the actions or inactions of officials of the electoral umpire and sundry political actors and the extent they worked to guarantee free and fair electoral process would have become manifest. This is more so against the background of some of the infractions recorded in parts of the country in the presidential and National Assembly election held two weeks ago.

The outcome of the elections would provide a veritable yardstick to assess the overall performance of the current leadership of the electoral body under Mahmood Yakubu. This is more compelling given serious issues and reservations raised against penultimate Saturday’s elections. Opinions have been expressed in many quarters that the overall conduct of that election fell short of the progress recorded in 2015.

It may be convenient for some to repudiate this assertion citing some of the comments of international observers especially in the area of the peaceful conduct of voters. But the truth is that there were manifest infractions that cast serious slur on the capacity of that election to truly reflect the wishes and aspirations of the electorate as freely expressed at the ballot box.

Not only were there reports of ballot box snatching and deliberate acts of sabotage sometimes leading to the burning of INEC offices and materials in some places, smart card readers were either stolen or deliberately put into disuse to enable rogue politicians to swing the outcome of the polls to predetermined directions.

Perhaps, the gravest infractions recorded during that election were in the area of collation of election results. Compromised INEC officials deliberately made the process ineffective by either hiding or securing the services of law enforcement agencies in connivance with politicians to bar accredited agents of the parties from accessing the collation points. With that, they had a field day to write results that had nothing to do with the actual number of votes cast. Instances where returning officers had to declare election results under duress illustrate most poignantly some of the glaring imperfections of that election. And one asks where were the security agencies when returning officers were forced to declare results? If such could happen at that level, then your guess is as good as mine.

It was therefore the general expectation that INEC would take a serious perspective of all these complaints and infractions and ensure they do not rear their ugly heads in the governorship and state assembly elections. They must take more seriously the role of security agencies.We were made to believe that security agencies will provide a secure environment for the voters and agents of the parties to perform their electoral obligations without let or hindrance.

But allegations of partisanship were very rife; precipitating demonstrations in some states by women groups at army and police headquarters. Apparently in reaction to this, the Nigerian Army came out to reassure of their impartiality in electoral matters. But the import of the demonstrations at their headquarters as well as that of the police should not be lost on these key security institutions.

How acceptable those assurances are will predicate on the roles security agencies play in the governorship and state assembly elections. There have been suggestions that the stakes of the governorship and state assembly elections are not as high as those of the presidency and National Assembly. This school of thought believes the tension associated with the first election would considerably reduce in subsequent ones.

Whereas one may be inclined to share in the opinion that the stakes of the presidential election are much higher given our convoluted federal contraption and the sweeping powers at the disposal of the center, it is no less correct that localized elections can also be that vicious, rancorous and contentious. Given this, our security agencies still have more work to do as they had during the presidential and National Assembly elections. In many of the states where sundry electoral infraction were prevalent, allegation were that the situation would have been different had the security agencies lived up to their professional responsibilities. In many of these states, the parties have mobilized to take their destinies in their own hands. They do not seem to have been sufficiently reassured that the security agencies will be fair to all contenders and political parties.

We may witness more acts of violence as the various political parties resort to self-help in protecting their votes. We may see more organized resistance from the people to any attempt to circumvent the rules of the game or use security agencies to do the selfish bidding of politicians. All these will further raise tension during the elections. The outcome may snowball into more violence and killings than witnessed during the presidential and National Assembly elections.

But all this will predicate on the overall perception and dispositions of the security agencies. All will depend on how truly the security agencies are seen to be manifestly impartial in their conduct. Apart from the actions of officials of the electoral umpire, the successful outcome of that election will depend on the actions and the inactions of security agencies.

It is the minimum expectation that they should proceed beyond these assurances and issues clear instructions to their men and officers to strictly adhere to the rules of engagement. Electoral infractions impair the growth of democracy and it should be in the interest of our security agencies to ensure that genuine grounds are provided for our democracy to thrive without let or hindrance. It is in our national interest that the rules of free and fair electoral contest are neither abridged nor compromised.

Since we have opted for representative democracy as opposed to other forms of governance framework, all our energies ought to be channeled on how to perfect that order rather than explore loopholes to incapacitate its effective functioning. Unfortunately, not many of our political actors are fully committed to allowing the participant political culture to germinate and flourish. But there exists a limit beyond which we cannot continue to trample on or sabotage the collective will and destiny of the peopleunder the guise of practicing democracy. We must not only begin to make substantial progress in the rungs of the democratic ladder but demonstrate discernable commitment to it such that will disabuse views held in some circles that Africans abhor opposition and benevolent dictatorship is most suitable for their organization. That is the potent danger we face given the wobbling and fumbling that have been the miserable fate of our electoral process and democratic outing.

But it appears not much will change unless we identify and seriously address both the manifest and latent factors that propel and reinforce bitter competition for political power that has been the greatest undoing of our political recruitment process. Why our politicians seek power at all costs is at the root of the unwholesomeness of our electoral process.

We are contending with the imperfections of a federal order that compels the constituent units toseek power to take advantage of its enormous resourcesfor the advantage of their ethnic groups and members of their family. This in turn, breeds corruption and other associated ills. A dysfunctional federal order and corruption are two sides of the same coin. The first breeds and incubates the other.

As long as we continue with this decadent federal order, so long will our electoral process witness the kind of assault we have seen in the past. It will be neigh impossible for people that emerged through a corrupt electoral process to fight systemic corruption. There is a choice before us.