President Goodluck Jonathan, former President of Nigeria, explained why he conceded defeat in the 2015 Presidential Election. During an interview session on Arise TV, the former president said the circumstance presently is quite different from his own. This is because President Buhari has graciously served for eight years. He is handing over to his own political parties. He also noted that the country’s mood generally shows some are happy and others sad based on the issues from the elections.
Goodluck Jonathan confirms the fear in the minds of his team on the possibility of the thrown into jail when the new government takes over without giving a fair hearing in court. He also said he conceded the defeat because he was more interested in the country than himself. And he also advised Politicians to be more interested in the country than themselves.
How Do We Ensure Nigeria Comes Out of the Current Electoral Controversies?
The Anchor of the programme asked a very important question. How do we ensure that Nigeria comes out of the current electoral controversies through reforms that will help to grow the country’s democracy? Goodluck responded that the problem we have is the INEC (The Electoral Management Body) and the Security. Siting an example, when two teams are playing, and the Referee decides to look the other way, the players will injure themselves. When people are contesting for election, you should expect that it’s like a soccer game, where everybody wants to win. The Electoral Management Body shares more than 60% of the blame. If they do their work well, the Politicians will have no choice but to follow the rules. INEC and Security are the cause.
He believes we will get there someday. Despite our migration from card reader to BVAS, which is a superior technology. Why do we still have problems? Migrating from manual to electronic did not seem to solve the problem. It’s advisable we commission one of the internationally recognized IT companies to develop and manage solutions to voting in Nigeria. Such IT companies will want to protect their image. They can train our people, but they should manage it. Managing it means Nigerians will not be allowed to manipulate it.
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