29th May, 2018
By: Amir Abdulazeez
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or many
years, I have developed a strong culture of reading a hard copy of at least one
national daily every day; even this digital age with the proliferation of
online media has not discouraged this culture of mine. This morning, when I
left home in search of a Newspaper to begin the day with, I suddenly remembered
it was Democracy Day and therefore just discarded the idea. Why? Because, today’s
dailies would be filled to capacity with sycophantic congratulatory advertorials
by favour seekers and politicians to their fellow politicians, many of which
have little or nothing to do with true democratic ideals.
When I read
some weeks ago that the Inspector General of the Nigerian Police reportedly refused
to honour the invitation without any tangible reason of the Nigerian Senate, I
kept wondering whether we still have a functional democracy in this country. If
the Chief Law Enforcer of the nation can do that in a democracy regardless of
the motive or justification, one must have every reason to be pessimistic. The parliament
of any nation, no matter how bad it is, is the heart of its democracy and when
it is so brazenly disregarded and disrespected, you can only wonder what future
holds for such a democracy.
Granted that
our National Assembly has sapped itself of so much honour and respect over the
years to warrant such a treatment, but it is still constitutionally the most
critical organ of our democracy and hence should still retain the minimum
respect and power to summon even the president at any time, not to talk of any
of his subordinates or appointees. Respecting the National Assembly is quite
different from respecting the personalities that makes its composition. By the
way, isn’t it a sign of a failed democracy that we continue to have doubtful
personalities as legislators and without the trend appearing to be stopping any
soon?
One major activity
that preceded this year’s Democracy Day commemoration was the ruling APC’s
ward, local and state congresses. I didn’t pay much attention to be able to
give a general verdict on the nationwide exercise, but I am privy to enough
information to conclude that no proper congresses took place in my local
government. The process was so undemocratic that there was no proper competition
and organization; those who were favoured were simply returned 100%.
First, what
happened in my local government is not something uncommon; infact, it is the
regular practice in almost all other local governments across the nation. However,
the worrying part of it is how we keep normalizing undemocratic practices across
virtually all political parties in the name of democracy which we claim to be
celebrating every year. One cannot actually recall when last a major political
party in Nigeria actually held a proper, transparent, honest and competitive ward
to national congresses devoid of impunity, imposition, interference and
outright violation of party and INEC rules.
Sometimes,
one wonders, how many of the Nigerian presidents, governors and legislators
that served from 1999 to date would even come close to occupying those seats if
true democracy was really practiced in Nigeria? If political parties operated
on internal democracy, how many people would have emerged as candidates in the
first place? How many true winners have been denied victory by the shameless
elections of 2003 and 2007? If the rule of law was truly operational over that
period, how many of them would have completed their terms?
As we celebrate
our 19th democratic anniversary, the Nigerian government is yet to
decisively and satisfactory respond or tackle the local and international
concerns of alleged military atrocities and excesses in their operations not
only in the North East, but also across other locations in the country. We are
still battling with allegations of state abuse and disregard of court orders in
this celebrated democracy. Our prisons are seen as centres of human rights
abuse with no consequences. These are some of the many things we ought to
reflect on at times like these.
What exactly
do we celebrate every year? Are we celebrating genuine progress towards democracy
or are we just celebrating an end to military rule? From 1999 to date, how much
have we improved in terms of freedom of speech, internal party democracy,
transparency in governance, separation of powers, enduring electoral reforms, justice
for the common man, equity and social justice and so many other democratic
ideals? What parameters have we developed to assess ourselves and the progress
we are making or not making democratically?
While we celebrate this so-called democracy, we must
remember that it is still largely the amount of money you have that mainly
determines your success in elections; people win elections without any
manifesto; party officials at virtually all levels are not elected but
selected; godfathers are still the movers and shakers of politics; majority of
Nigerians are still largely politically ignorant without any effective
mechanism for voter education in place for the foreseeable future; election
offenders and fraudsters are still not punished; local government elections are
still a sham; there is no level playing ground for non-incumbents against
incumbents; our courts are largely seen not to be doing justice to electoral
disputes; our electoral laws are still at the mercy of senators who are more
partisan than patriotic; a theoretically independent electoral commission and so
many other unaddressed issues.
This year’s
democracy day as usual has been all about elected and appointed officials and
politicians reeling out their achievements in office which have been carefully crafted
by aides. These are many of the achievements they keep repeating every year as
if they are reading from the same speech. Though such a thing is not unexpected
as the day coincides with their milestones in office, but the real spirit of
revisiting our progress in upholding democratic ideals individually and collectively
shouldn’t be completely neglected in favour of self-praise-singing.
Celebrating
19 years of consecutive civilian rule in a country with a history of long term military
rule is not out of place, but it must go beyond declaration of public holidays,
delivering lectures and speeches, organizing thanksgivings or sponsoring
billions in the pages of newspapers. It must be a critical reflection of how
that civilian rule has given people more equal opportunities, responsible
freedom, timely justice, political hope, sustainable prosperity and a better
future.
The reasonable
expectation is not that our democracy should be perfect after just 19 years,
but how much are we doing to fix the basics. What are the efforts made over
these years and what fruits are the efforts yielding? If we are to be taken
serious, we must start taking actions on how to truly minimize the undemocratic
practices and principles in our nation before the next Democracy Day.
Twitter: @AmirAbdulazeez
