POLITICAL VIOLENCE AND THE ELECTORAL PROCESS IN NIGERIA: A CASE STUDY OF 2015 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION IN HADEJIA LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA, JIGAWA STATE.

CHAPTER ONE

1.0 INTRODUCTION

The Nigerian authorities and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) must prevent a repeat of the polical violence that characterized the 2007 and 2003 election the political environment is however very tenure in the run up to the election, the country has seen an incensement of violence.

Several hundred people have been killed in politically motivation communal and sectarian violence across Nigeria in the past six month. In addition human rights depending and journalist, who play a key role in motoring Nigeria’s up-coming election in April, are facing increasing intimidation and harassment yet the Nigerian authorities have failed to bring suspected perpetrators to justice, or take effective measures to prevent further human right abuses.

The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) says no fever than 58 people have been killed in election related violence in 22 states from December, 3, 2014 to date.

Chairman, Governing Council of the Commission, Prof. Chidi Odinkalu, made the revelation on Friday in Abuja while a representing a report entitled, “pre-election report and advisory on violence in Nigeria’s 2015 general elections.”

Odinkalu said, that within 50 days from December 3, 2014, the commission had confirmed 61 incidences of election violence with the majority of the cases recorded in three key economic and politically significant states.

“In Lagos, we have tracked at least 11 incidences producing 22 dead people for each incident, an average of 2 people killed over a span of just 52 days”.

“In Kaduna states, we have three incidents and mine killings; Rivers has six incidents, including the detonation of explosives and attacks on courts”.

He said, “This degree of pre-election violence is unacceptable, we have seen too much blood and this must be stopped”.

If this continues, it will lead the country in to more trouble and so this is more than a report, it is an advisory because it calls on all the leaders to rise to the challenge.

Odinkalu said, the political leaders must send a message loud and clear to their teeming supporters that the forth coming election was not a call to battle but a contest between brothers and sisters.

“This is an advisory addressed to Nigeria’s leader’s politicians, communalities, citizens and friends. It explains why the country must turn the page on a long and worsening history of election violence”. The National Human Right Commission’s governing Council Chairman said.

Furthermore, Nigerians must be able to vote in peace, as the right to vote was a human right and citizens, through the exercise of their right, conferred legitimacy on their government.

Nigerians went to the polls in April, 2011 to elect new sets of public officials in fourth nationwide elections since the return to civilian rule in 1999. Regardless of some flaws, the election were deemed to be the most organized, free and fair in the country election history. Despite the heavy of politically motivated killings and the ruthless man-handling of civilians during political campaigns and rallies in some states indicated that elections are still perceived as a “door die” affair in the country. Conducting free, fair and credible elections in Nigeria is undoubtedly a big challenge, because the “political players” are not ready to play the game according to rules. This is even worst as there are no severe sanctions for perpetrators of electoral misconducts and violence.

 Therefore, the 2011 general elections held in April or chest rated violence which left more than 800 people dead and more than 65,000 homeless, with more than 350 churches burnt (Human Rights Watch, 2014). The violence began with protests by supports of the main opposition presidential confidential candidates Muhammad Buhari, a Northern Muslim from the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), following the re-election of the incumbent Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian South who was a candidate of the People Democratic Party (PDP). It degenerated into sectarian and religions killings (Human Right Watch 2014).

However, some factors are traced to occurrence of electoral violence in Nigeria. It is poverty, unemployment, ineffectiveness of security force and culture of impurity by government. Illiteracy, zero-sum politics, poor handing of election by the electoral commission, corruption among electoral officials unresolved ethnic differences, democratic deficit, diminishing popularity of the ruling party, internal conflicts within the main rival parties and unemployment among youths, selfish interest and ideological bankruptcy among others.

In Nigeria, electoral violence is made possible because the political system supported zero-sum politics as the wining parties considers the losing parties stiff opponent who has nothing to offer to the winning party, which eventually forms government. This however, led visible as a result of the structural and attitudinal in balance in the Nigerian society on the part of political leaders.

However, the democratization process in the country is threaded as a result of the manipulation and subversion of peoples will which often leads to violence. What happens is those politicians, conscious of the values of the spoils of the office, adopted various means to ensure that they capture power; they buy votes, rig elections and commit other infidelities designed to subvert the people’s will to choose leaders capable of leading the state towards development and enduring democracy.

The country’s electoral management body is not strong enough to with stand the pressure exerted by the political system and the electoral misconducts that accompanies it continues to threaten the deepening of democratization process. The negative effects of electoral violence in the country continues to reduce the citizen’ confidence in the democratic process as well as heighten the fears of possible democratic collapse.

Furthermore, the 2015 general elections had been concluded with the winners declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Chairman “Prof. Attahiru Jega”. The election was the fifth elections in the country since 1999. Before was the elections, several political leaders expressed concerns about security issue as a result of tension between the North and South on the issue of power rotation. The concern expressed borders on the determination of the north to reclaim power and the incumbent president Jonathan from the South to seek another term in office. All progressive congress youths political party that had the main opposition leader as its presidential candidate engaged in violent conflict with that of the incumbent president’s party, leading to burning of the ruling party’s campaign vehicles. Also the director general of APC presidential campaigns, chibuike amaechi and governor of river state was attack by gunman, who opened fire on his convey while campaigning at obio akpor-a home town of the PDP governorship candidate Nyesom wike (winsor, 2015).

     According national human rights commission, between January and February 2015, about 58 people were killed 61 incidences of election violence across 22 states in the country. As a result of rising tension and like lines of unprecedented violence, a peace accord mediated by former head of state general Abdussalami Abubakar was signed by the two leading presidential candidates the incumbent. President Goodluck jonathan and his main challenger, Muhammad Buhari. By signing the peace accord, the two leading candidates agreed to avoid action that could engender violence during and after the elections.

 However this study examines the implications of electoral violence on democratization process, with particular reference to 2011 and 2015 general election in Nigeria and how the country can manage the electoral process without much threat to the democratic stability. With considerable negative effects of electoral violence on the polical system, the research, therefore proffer recommendations on how electoral related violence can be reduced as well as controlled the study however will constitutes additional literature to existing body of knowledge in the area of democratization. It was also reforms relevant data bank for policy makers, election management body, electoral system and the general reading public.

1.1   Background of the study

Violence is a ubiquitous phenomenon in every society and every sphere of social life. It is not restricted to the political sphere alone. It cuts across every aspect of human existence. This means that political violence is just a subset of violence. It takes many forms including kidnapping, Assassination, arson, thuggery etc. this shows that we are in a violent world and the tendency to be violence increases by the day. Violence has no territorial boundary. It is as universal as it prejates modernity. For instance, Ekiran (2006:286) notes that both the Al-Qur’an and Bible accounts of creation and the event that followed in the garden of Eden particularly Adam and Eve’s refusal to obey God’s simple instruction, amount to violence of a sort.

Rejection of a superior’s injection is tantamount to violent behavior’s because the world violence has its roots from violation or infringement (Ninalowo, 2004; 187, so when one violates or infringes on a laid down principle it amounts to violence. Therefore, violence can be described as an unruly behaviour perpetrated to express anger and dissatisfaction over some social issue which the perpetrators felt have affected or likely to affect them in one way or another.

Elections are regarded as the hall mark of democratic governance in every democratic society. This is because elections are one of the ways through which people engage. In political participation. Elections have became the most acceptable methods by which citizens of an ever increasing number of political systems choose their leaders the appeal of election lies principally in the opportunity that it provides for an entire electorate to participate in choosing those that should govern them in a simple and peaceful exercise (Momoh, 2015; 31).

Election also provide the people with the opportunity to indicate their preference among the policies and programmers presented to them by the rival leadership elements contesting for political power (Ayeni – Akeke, 2008:27), elections may also enable the people to remove unpopular leaders or force elected officials to listen to their grievances, particularly betweens elections. Most elected public officers are always conscious of when their terms are over, they would need to fall back to them people to the people to renew their mandate.

Therefore, the fear that they might to rejected if the fail to heed to the complaints of the people in non-election years, make them to pay attention to the views and aspirations to the electorate.

All the functions that election perform, it is the opportunity that it provides for the people to choose their leaders that is most emphasized. Yet the extent to which it provides this opportunity varies from one political system to another. For example, in totaliafarian political system, election is the means by which the leader seeks to confer legitimacy on the regime and governance as well as the contestants nominated to face the electorate for approval.

Election malpractices constitute a form of political corruption; electoral fraud is therefore politically destabiling economically wasteful and destructive to government development and improvement capacity. It destroyed the legitimacy of government structure, heighten problems of national disintegration and upset ethnic balance for the individual listener who take election as a means to exercise political power no matter how small it may be.

Election are at heart of the structure of the functioning of modern democratic state and accompanies by irregularities and discrepancies.

The Nigeria first, second, third and fourth republic blew the pipe of ethnic politics and political corruption. Events of the past there is seriously shaking the confidence of the Nigeria people in the methods by which they choose their governing officials. It is very difficult to imagine how a country continue to believe that the electoral were that of state house of assembly, national assembly, guber-national and presidential offices. Even through the independent electoral commission (INEC) meticulously and zealously planned for these elections, the election days witnessed confusion and all manner of electoral mal-practices such that, the INEC’S preparedness was brought to question. Results from the entire exercise were probably the most contentious and most lingering (Yaqub, 2015:19).

Long after the even event, there were still litigations after litigations. The election were annealed in certain states of the federation while in others, results remain controversial. This was so because; those who emerged victorious did so through irregular activities. I.e. Rigging and Violence the elections conducted in Nigeria cannot be said to have occurred without electoral violence. The evens which trailed the Guber-national elections in Nigeria form the focus of this research.

1.2   Statement of the problems

Elections are the central processes of democratic representatives government because in any democracy the authority of government derives the principal mechanism for translation the consent into government authority ideally is by holding free and fair elections. In Nigeria, elections have become an avenue for legitimization of bad governance. This assertion hinges on the fact that incumbent government holds on to power at all cost while opposition parties in a bid to capture state power, resort to all manner of irregularities. The result of this is usually violence of one sort or the other.

Presently the problem in Nigeria seems to have assumed a different dimension. For instance, one group of politicians has continued to accuse the other on various issues. One of such issues is about the legitimacy of the present crop of leadership. Presently, the ruling party in the state has two faction repaired to as “PDP ONE” or state PDP while the second is called PDP TWO or Abuja PDP. One group blames the other for lack of transparency in the electoral process as their reason for emergence.
The overall consequence of this development is that the political atmosphere in Nigeria remains tensed. Politically, Nigeria is like a ticking time bow and a political catastrophe waiting to be unleashed.

This work therefore sets out examine the factors responsible for outbreak of violence common pattern of violence and practice in the third world countries. It is easy to locate and situated the problem of democratic transition through popular election within the context of electoral malpractice.

1.3Aims and Objectives of the study

ü Given that all the elections in Nigeria have always had a common pattern of being characterized by malpractice. It be comes clear that the objectives of this study to conduct a survey of general nature of this study to conduct a survey of general nature of elections political system, the study aims among other things.

1.     To appraise the 2015 presidential elections in Nigeria with a view to identifying its challenges to Nigeria’s Electoral Process.

ü To identify and discuss the reason why politicians in Nigeria resorted to violence in the quest for the presidential sears.

ü It will documents various type of electoral malpractice that has occurred during the presidential elections.

ü The work will try find out why this problem continues to increase in the Nigeria political process.

ü It will proper solutions to the problems of electoral malpractice in order to move the country forward in the areas of democratic political transition.

1.4Research Question

The research questions are examined as follows:

ü What are the factors that generated violence during the 2015 presidential election in Nigeria?

ü Did ethnic and religious consideration influence the electoral process in Nigeria?

ü What are the ways of reducing political violence in Nigeria?

 The researcher intends to answer this question using the aims and objective stated below.

1.5 Justification/Significance of the study

election are water shed in the political development of any country to the extent that political stability of a country defends on the integrity of its electoral systems.

    This significance of the study 6 in the ability to highlight the constraints which electoral malpractice posses on the electoral system and the political system in general, as matter of fact a study of the factors which made this election rough will contribute to better understanding of the problems posed by malpractice in free election in the nations.

    In this regard, this study will go long ways to educate and inculcate the Nigerian electorates on the ill of election malpractice. It is believed that this research will not only add to existing literature on elections and electoral malpractice, but will serve as a guide in planning and conducting future elections in the country.

1.6 Scope And Limitation of The Study

 It has been observed that violence is a common features / occurrence in the conduct of elections in Nigeria. This has, often times, imparted negatively on the credibility of Nigerian electoral process. The scope of this study therefore covers the elections held in 2015 presidential election in Hadejia Local Government Area. Major problem encountered were time constraints, bureaucracy and reliability of the source or materials. Not with standing, the researcher came up with findings that would be worth making reference to in future.

Problem encountered in the field

during  the field work, the problems encountered in the study include the following: politicians were very reluctant in completing the questionnaires from mangu and shendam, this was even manifested more in shendam when we were invitied by the divisional police officer who question our activities .

ü There was also the problem of finance as the researcher hired research assistants it was a financial burden.

ü Some respondents collected the questionnaire and failed to return them. At the we left they were now here to be found.

1.7 Historical background of the study area presidential election

The president of the federal republic of Nigeria is the head of state and head of the national executive of Nigeria. The president of Nigeria is also the commander-in-chief of the Nigerian armed forces. The president is elected in national elections which takes place every four years. The first president of Nigeria was Nnamidi Azikiwe who took office on October 1, 1963. The current president, Muhammadu Buhari took office on may 29,15 as the 15^th president of the federal republic of Nigeria.

    In may 1999, major general Abdulsalami Abubakar stepped down, and the former military head of state, olusegun obasanjo’s became the selected president who served two terms in office.

2007 election, the Nigerian presidential election of 2007 were held on 21 April, 2007. When Umaru musa yar’adua won the highly controversial election for the ruling people’s Democratic party (PDP) and was sworn in on 29^th, may, 2007. The ruling PDP won 26^th of the 32 states, according to INEC, including Kaduna state and Hadejia Local Government Area, where the results were contested by the local population. (Wikipedia, 2007).

Following the presidential election, groups monitoring the election gave it a dismal assessment. Chief European union observer Max van den berg reported that the handling of the polls had “fallen that short” of basic international standards, and that “the process cannot be considered to be credible.” A spoken for the United States department of state. Said it was “deeply treble.” by election polls, calling them “flawed”, and said it hoped the political parties would resolve any differences over the election through peaceful, constitutional means. (Wikipedia 2007).

2011 elections, a parliamentary election was held in Nigeria on 9^th April, 2011. The election was originally scheduled to be held on 2 April, but was later postponed to 4^th April.

A presidential election was held in Nigeria on 16^th April 2011, postponed from 9^th April, 2011. The election follows controversy as to whether a Muslim or Christian should be allowed to become president given the tradition of rotating the death of Umaru Yar Adua, who was a Muslim, and Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian assumed the interim president following the election wide spread violence took place in northern of the country. Goodluck Jonathan was declared the winner on 19 April. The election was reported in the international media as having run smoothly with relatively little violence or voter fraud in contrast to previous election, in particular the widely disputed 2007 election. The united state department said; the election was “successful” and a “substantial improvement” over 2007, although it added that vote rigging and fraud also took place.

2015 elections, the 2015 general election was originally scheduled to hold 14^th February but was later postponed to 28 March (Presidential) and General Muhammad Buhari of the All Progressive Congress emerged as the winner of the presidential election and was sworn in on 29^th May 2015. It was the first time in the history of Nigeria that an incumbent president lost an election.

Goodluck Ebele Jonathan of the people democratic part lost his seat to Gen. Muhammadu Buhari of the all progressives congress.

The problems associated with the first post-independent national election 0f 1964 and the 1965 western region election culminated in the Jan 15, 1966 coup. The former was features by wide spread rigging , intimidation , and chaos that some of the major political parties decided to boycott the election, creating in its aftermath serious constitutional dilemma. The latter of election of the western region was also marred by the problem of massive rigging and other irregularities plus wide spread violence, giving the impetus for the first military coup in Nigeria and the culture of instability that to be set the country for over three decades.

Other elections that have taken place in Nigeria after the 1979 elections have not pared better. The 1979 election that saw the emergency of Alhaji Shehu Shagari as civilian president was criticized by inter-national observers as having been massively rigged the 1983 elections, four years later was even worse marred by corruption, political, violence and polling irregularities, it provided another set of military adventurers the impetus to seize power on Dec 31, 1983, citing electoral malpractices as one of its reasons for over throwing the civilian government.

The 1999, 2003, and 2007 elections, three elections conducted during this period often of years of Nigerian is democracy have been lampooned by many critics as far from free and fair. In fact, the elections of April 2007, conducted by the existing electoral body, Independent National Electoral Commission (I.N.E.C) under the leadership of Maurice Iwu has been described as the worst election ever held in this country as a result of indescribable irregularities which marred the election.

1.8 Definition of the Terms/concept

ü Political violence: political violence is violence perpetrated by people or governments to achieve political goals. It can describe violence used by a state against other states (war) or against non-state actors. (Chris Alden: 21, Dec, 2007).

ü Electoral system: An electoral system may be defined as a process or method through which the people of a given country elect their representatives in to different political offices or position in government. (Dibie C. Chris: March, 1999 P.P:107 essentials Government).

ü Election Malpractices: this refers to service of action that is taken during election periods which bring about political corruption in the government. (Sarah Birch, 22 Dec, 2011).

1.9 Plan of the study/outline of Chapters

This research is structured in to five chapters. Chapter one; introduces the work, it comprises of the statement of the problem, aims and objectives, Research Question, Significance, Scope and Limitations, Historical Background of the Study Area and Definition of the terms. Chapter two comprises of a review of relevant Literature, Conceptual, Frame Work, Empirical Literature and theatrical Frame work and also comprises the concept such as: Electoral system, Political violence, the 2015 General Election, Causes, Solution, Effect and Implication of Electoral violence. In Chapter three, consist of Research Design, Population of the Study, Sample Size, Sampling techniques, Methods of Data Collection, Method of Data Analysis and research instrument. While, Chapter four, Present Data Presentation and Analysis from the Field of Presidential Election in Nigeria, Demographic Data of the Respondent, Respondent Presentation and analysis. And chapter five; Discusses the finding, conclusion of the study; it also present relevant and emergent recommendation and Appendix.

All the five chapters contains references each.

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