Former Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Professor Attahiru Jega, has called for the electronic transmission of election results in the country.
According to him replacing the manual transmission of results with electronic transmission will help restore the integrity of the country’s electoral process.
He made the call on Friday during a national political summit in Abuja, ahead of the general elections in 2023.
“Transmission of election results has been one of the key areas in which reckless, unpatriotic, and self-serving politicians have undermined the integrity of the Nigerian electoral process,” Jega said.
“Bringing remarkable integrity to the Nigerian electoral process, therefore, would no doubt require the jettisoning of the traditional obtuse manual transmission of results, and its replacement with using appropriate technology with electronic transmission of results.”
Professor Jega also expressed worries over citizens’ lack of trust in the electoral process and the poor performances by those elected through the process.
A Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Mike Ozekhome, on his part blamed the failure of the electoral system on Nigerians who ‘enthrone tyranny during elections for peanuts’.
“Are we practicing democracy? No. We are practicing election-ocracy, that is my new term for it. What do I mean by election-ocracy? Every four years, Nigerians go out to the poll to carry out a ritual of electing their leaders,” he explained.
“They never actually elect them anyway because their leaders select themselves, they are state captors. They have captured the state.”
In his remarks, A political economist, Professor Pat Utomi, proposes a solution – the merger of three political parties aside from the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
He said, “To project these desires, the comity of NCFront for Political Parties is proposing the merger of three of the leading political parties outside of the PDP and the APC to merge with a plan to absorb other parties and righteous wings of the APC and the PDP.”
Many of the participants believe that Nigerians must be ready to embrace the right motives of electing those that will lead them via a credible electoral process to ensure good governance in the country.
