Overturning of Kano, Zamfara, Plateau voters’ decision in court unfortunate – Obasanjo
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has described as ‘unacceptable’ the decision of three to five judges in overturning the decisions made by millions of voters during an election.
Obasanjo, who spoke at the high-level consultation on Rethinking Western Liberal Democracy in Africa held at Green Resort Legacy, Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library, Abeokuta, Ogun State, Obasanjo faulted what he labelled “cathedral pronouncements” by the judges.
Obasanjo, reacted to the ongoing judgements of the Court of Appeal on the electoral disputes arising from 2023 elections in Nigeria, which has led the sacking of three governors.
The affected governors are, Dauda Lawal of Zamfara State, Abba Kabir Yusuf in Kano, and Caleb Mutfwang of Plateau State.
According to the former President, the powers vested in the few judges is “totally unacceptable”, cautioning political leaders on the dangers of injustice if the trend is not reversed by the Supreme Court.
Obasanjo said “I believe whatever form of democracy we have or whatever system of government we have, three or four men in the judiciary should not be able to overturn the decisions of millions that have voted. Now, we have to find a way to handle that. I don’t know what the way will be but, for me, I think it’s totally unacceptable that millions (of votes), maybe 10m on one side, maybe 9million on the other side. Then, you have five people sitting down, three of them agree, two disagree. And you come up and make cathedral pronouncements that cannot be changed, I believe that should not be accepted.
“How do we do it? I don’t know. But whatever form of democracy we have, we should look at how to handle this. If you say ‘go again for election,’ then, what happened to the previous election? I don’t know.
“So, I personally feel strongly about. It does not matter what you say about the judiciary, but in fact only five people or seven will sit down. If they are five, three may agree, two may not agree, and the decision of three will be final. All that you have done comes to the decision of three or decision of four.”
Speaking on what he tagged, ‘Nigerian factor’, Obasanjo said he is not always comfortable with the phrase, ‘Nigerian factor’, when discussing democracy and other issues affecting development.
He noted that he came across the ‘Nigerian factor’ slang when the nation held the first local government election and his party lost because politicians said he refused to take cognisance of the Nigerian factor while planning for the election.
“When things go wrong, you said the Nigerian factor. The first thing I learnt in politics was this thing I called Nigerian factor. In 1998, we had the first local government election. We had parties, and here in Abeokuta, we met in my office and they came up and said, ‘look, this is money for INEC, money for the police.’ At a stage I said, ‘what nonsense! Is police not being paid, and INEC too?’
“They said ‘that’s how we do it. I said ‘you cannot do that.’ So, they didn’t do that. And of course, we lost all the local governments. We lost all. And then they came to me and said, ‘Baba, you see? If you had allowed us to do it the way we used to do it, we would have won’. And I felt guilty.
“During the next election which was State Assembly, I just stayed in my house. I said ‘well, do whatever you want to do, I will not be part of it’. So, I didn’t even go. But, the result was the same. One of the people who got money didn’t even distribute it to where he was supposed to distribute it,” Obasanjo recounted.
The octogenarian emphasised that the Western liberal democracy being practised in Africa has not really taken human nature and the African situation into full account.
While saying it is time to be realistic, Obasanjo said a hungry man will sell his vote for just N1000.
“When you are hungry, whatever anybody tells you cannot go in. Poverty is a great enemy of democracy. Ignorance or lack of education is a great enemy of democracy. And we seem to be deliberately fomenting poverty and lack of education,” he stated.
