By Celestine Kezie Jr.
In democracy, sovereignty and legitimacy lie with the people. Hence, the people exercise the inalienable right to choose who governs them. A subversion of this process would be to foist on the people a ruler they do not choose which then angers them to withhold their legitimacy from such a ruler thus throwing a spanner into the rolling wheels of nation building.
Nation building, in the light of the leadership-followership synergy that drives it, anchors on the sanctity of the electoral process. Little wonder the presidential candidate of the Labour Party for the February 25th presidential election, H.E. Peter Obi has repeatedly emphasised that "the process that takes one to power is more important than what one does with power". Living true to this conviction, PO did not incite violence or breakdown of Law and order even though he has at his beck and call the most forceful youth movement in Africa.
Instead, he is gone to court to challenge the outcome of the presidential election hoping that the judiciary will right the wrong of February 25th lest democracy be doubly raped in Nigeria. The mood of the nation is melancholic since February 25th even though a winner was declared. Nigerians enthusiastically went to the polls on February 25th hoping to elect a president of their choice only to realize that Mahmood Yakubu-led INEC had a different agenda; Nigerians asked him for a presidential election, but INEC conducted a presidential auctioning. Too bad for our democracy! A jeopardy to nation building!
the process that takes one to power is more important than what one does with power..
ReplyDelete