In this post we will be looking at elections in Nigeria, voting rights in Nigeria, qualities of free and fair elections and key issues that defined Nigeria’s elections.
INTRODUCTION
Elections in Nigeria are forms of choosing representatives to the Federal Government of Nigeria and the various states in the fourth republic Nigeria. Elections in Nigeria started since 1959 with different political parties. It’s a method of choosing leaders where the citizens have right to vote and to be voted for. For 2023, Nigerians are getting ready for Presidential elections with about 93.4 million eligible voters across the federation for the 25 February election Nigerians elects on the federal level a head of state (the President of Nigeria) and a legislature (the National Assembly).
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The president is elected by the people. The National Assembly has two chambers. The House of Representatives has 360 members, elected for a four-year term in single-seat constituencies. The Senate has 109 members, elected for a four-year term: each of the 36 states are divided into 3 senatorial districts, each of which is represented by one senator; the Federal Capital Territory is represented by only one senator. Nigeria has a multi-party system, with two or three strong parties and a third party that is electorally successful. However, members of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) had controlled the presidency since elections were resumed in 1999 until 2015 when Muhammadu Buhari won the presidential election.
ELECTIONS BREIF HISTORY IN NIGERIA
1999 elections
Presidential elections were held in Nigeria on 27 February 1999. These were the first elections since the 1993 military coup, and the first elections of the Fourth Nigerian Republic.
2003 elections
Presidential elections were held in Nigeria on 19 April 2003.
2007 elections
The Nigerian general elections of 2007 were held on 14 April and 21 April 2007. Governorship and state assembly elections were held on 14 April, while the presidential and national assembly elections were held a week later on 21 April. late Umaru Yar’Adua won the highly controversial election for the ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP) and was sworn in on 29 May. The ruling PDP won 26 of the 32 states, according to Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), including Kaduna State and Katsina State, where the results were contested by the local population.
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Following the presidential election, groups monitoring the election gave it a dismal assessment. Chief European Union observer Max van den Berg reported that the handling of the polls had “fallen far short” of basic international standards, and that “the process cannot be considered to be credible.” A spokesman for the United States Department of State said it was “deeply troubled” by election polls, calling them “flawed”, and said it hoped the political parties would resolve any differences over the election through peaceful, constitutional means.
2011 elections
A parliamentary election was held in Nigeria on 9 April 2011. The election was originally scheduled to be held on 2 April but was later postponed to 4 April. A presidential election was held in Nigeria on 16 April 2011, postponed from 9 April 2011. The election follows controversy as to whether a Muslim or Christian should be allowed to become president given the tradition of rotating the top office between the religions and following the death of Umaru Yar’Adua, who was a Muslim, and Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian, assuming the interim presidency.
Following the election widespread violence took place in the northern parts of the country. Goodluck Jonathan was declared the winner on 19 April. The elections were reported in the international media as having run smoothly with relatively little violence or voter fraud in contrast to previous elections, in particular the widely disputed 2007 election. The United States State Department said the election was “successful” and a “substantial improvement” over 2007, although it added that vote rigging and fraud also took place.
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2015 elections The 2015 general elections were originally scheduled to hold 14 February, but was later postponed to 28 March {Presidential, Senatorial and House of Representatives} and 11 April 2015 {Governorship and state house of Assembly}. General Muhammadu Buhari of the All-Progressives Congress emerged as the winner of the Presidential elections and was sworn in on 29 May 2015.
The 2015 Election was a success because there were tensions everywhere concerning the difficult politics and the security environment of the country at that time. However, it was the first time in the history of Nigeria that an incumbent president lost an election. Goodluck Ebele Johnathan of the People’s Democratic Party lost his seat to Muhammadu Buhari of the All-Progressives Congress.
2019 elections
Presidential and National Assembly Elections were scheduled for 16 February 2019, while State and Local government elections were scheduled for 2 March 2019. Elections were postponed by one week after INEC cited logistic challenges. The rescheduled dates are 23 February and 9 March 2019. President Muhammadu Buhari was re-elected for another four-year term.
The primary contender was former vice president, Atiku Abubakar of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP). Kingsley Moghalu of the Young Progressives Party (YPP), Yele Sowore of the African Action Congress (AAC) and Fela Durotoye of the Alliance for a New Nigeria (ANN) were other popular candidates who are all relatively young. Late in 2018, these three parties alongside some others attempted to form a coalition. However, the candidates pulled out of the coalition and decided to continue running on their respective platforms.
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There are 73 candidates contesting in the presidential election. The 2019 governorship and state house of assembly election was earlier scheduled for 2 March 2019 was rescheduled for Saturday 9, March 2019. With two major political parties; All Progressives Congress (APC) and People’s Democratic Party fielding candidates in the elections across various states except Rivers where a court order prohibits The All-Progressives Congress from fielding candidates as a result of internal crisis with the state chapter of the party. In Nigeria, the 2019 General Election came up with its own unique issues, challenges and successes that have not been witnessed in the previous five elections in Nigeria’s Fourth Republic.
2023 elections
General elections were held in Nigeria on 25 February 2023 to elect the President and Vice President and members of the Senate and House of Representatives. It is said that the election is characterised with high election malpractices. The election body decleared presidential election result with only 35% of collolated results and left the contestians with option of going to court. And court of law validated the result.
VOTING RIGHTS IN NIGERIA
The history of voting rights in Nigeria mirrors the complexity of the nation itself. Beginning within the country’s colonial period, elections in Nigeria began in 1923 by the direction of British colonial administrator Hugh Clifford through a legislative act known as the Clifford Constitution. However, reflecting the variety of people groups and distinctive cultures confined with the nation’s borders, the ethnolinguistic groups and colonial authorities that dominated the northern, eastern, and western regions of Nigeria (namely, the Hausa-Fulani, Igbo, and Yoruba people respectively) often offered vastly different perceptions into suffrage qualifications— notably including differences in gender, nationality, residency, age, tax, and income requirements— in Nigeria’s early years.
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Though the qualifications that assured voting rights eventually became standardized under the Federal Constitution of Nigeria of 1960, just as quickly as voting rights were clarified, they were wholly revoked at the onset of several military coups beginning in 1966 and lasting until 1999. Though there were intermittent republican governments, only four elections took place from 1966 to 1999. The electoral process has differed within the many of governments of Nigeria’s history and their corresponding constitutions.
Though women of the southern and eastern regions of the nation gained their voting rights in 1954, women of the northern region of Nigeria earned their right to vote in 1979. The suffrage movement was headed by several groups such as the Women’s Movement of Nigeria and the women’s wing of the Action Group. Currently, there is an ongoing struggle regarding the role of members of the diaspora in electoral processes. Though several inroads have been made in the form of bills introduced in both the House and Senate, no concrete successes have been made.
Qualities Of Free and Fair Elections
A free and fair election is defined by political scientist Robert Dahl as an election in which “coercion is comparatively uncommon”. A free and fair election involves political freedoms and fair processes leading up to the vote, a fair count of eligible voters who cast a ballot (including such aspects as electoral fraud or voter suppression), and acceptance of election results by all parties. An election may partially meet international standards for free and fair elections, or may meet some standards but not others. A study published in 2016 of elections in 169 countries over the period 1975 to 2011 estimated that only about half of elections were free and fair.
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The study evaluated ten dimensions of the conduct of elections:
- Legal framework (whether there was a constitutional right of citizens to vote and seek office, whether elections were held at regular intervals, and whether election-related laws were not changed immediately before an election)
- electoral management (whether gerrymandering occurred and whether election management bodies, if they existed, were independent, impartial, and accountable);
- electoral rights (whether citizens were generally able to vote on the basis of equal suffrage and access);
- voter registers (whether they were accurate, current, and open to voters for easy and effective voter registration);
- ballot access (whether candidates had in practice a right to compete in the election, with rejections of candidate applications being based on “internationally recognizable and acceptable norms” and with no candidate receiving more than 75% of the votes (a signal of malpractice or election boycotts);
- campaign process (whether elections were carried out without violence, intimidation, bribery (vote buying), use of government resources to advantage the incumbent, or a “massive financial advantage” for the incumbent;
- media access (whether freedom of speech was protected and whether the ruling party was disproportionately benefited by government-owned media;
- voting process (whether elections were conducted by secret ballot on a one person, one vote basis, with adequate security to protect voters and protection against ballot box stuffing, multiple voting, destruction of valid ballots, and other forms of manipulation;
- role of officials (whether the election was administered with adequately trained personnel, free from campaigning or intimidation at polling places, and with the ability of international election observers and party representatives to observe polling places; and
- counting of votes (whether votes were tabulated transparently and free of fraud or tampering)
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The 2016 study found that election quality decreased over time, primarily due to unfair election processes prior to election day. This was attributable to more non-democratic regimes holding elections over time; these elections sought to legitimize the regime’s rule without incurring the risk of the regime actually losing power. Increased election observation over the period may have also led to more flawed elections being tallied.
The presence of election monitors and constraints on executive power increases the probability of a free and fair election by 31 percentage points. The presence of election monitors, however, may be an endogenous variable because democracies are more likely to invite election observers than non-democratic regimes.
key issues that defined Nigeria’s elections
Last Saturday’s presidential and legislative elections were defined by four issues: election day operational challenges and the use of technology, violence and voter suppression, voter behaviour and the influence of money, and online falsehoods, the Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD) said in a report. The four issues “shaped the process, and provide some initial reflections on emerging trends from the voting so far”, the think tank said while making recommendations for “improving future processes in the short, medium and long time.”
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It said INEC’s new electoral technology appears to have struggled to meet expectations and improve transparency in the results collation process in particular, whilst the digital landscape continues to amplify existing tensions, with narratives that play up identities and party affiliations and question INECs performance and credibility. CDD added that INEC’s election day performance was not seamless, leading to the late start to voting in various polling units across the country. “INEC officials were present at polling stations before they opened at 0830 in just 36.7% of cases according to our observers with 32.5% arriving an hour or more after voting was scheduled to have commenced,” it stated.
It said a low turnout and a tendency to exchange cash for votes remained a feature of Nigerian elections. Violence, predominantly carried out by actors affiliated with political parties, was another enduring feature in some parts of the country during the election. The first stage of the 2023 elections was held as scheduled on 25 February 2023; a feat not achieved in the past three elections, which were all rescheduled. INEC had received commendation that it stuck to schedule in spite of prevailing insecurity across the country, perpetual fuel scarcity and the naira redesign policy, which created currency shortages and threatened to derail operational plans.