The next round of general election is in 2027, but it would seem that the frenzy over the election is so high that everywhere one turns nowadays, the noise is about endorsement and subtle campaign. The polity is being heated up!
For the first time in decades, Nigerians have seen election year come very quickly- over two years to a general election. The high level of frenzy by the politicians, for politicians, and of politicians creates an impression that the 2027 election is just tomorrow!
The talks about 2027 election began shortly after the inauguration of the Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration on May 29, 2023.
Unlike the usual practice where politicians restrained themselves from going full blast on open campaign ahead of an official lifting of ban on electioneering campaign by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), this time around, politicians have overruled the electoral umpire so to speak.
Not only that many of them have gone to town declaring that they would contest one election or the other in 2027, they have gone ahead to openly campaign for the re-election of the incumbent president.
Events are being held these days purely to endorse the President and do some form of mobilization. Some supporters of the president have had to wear some special attires with the President’s name and pictures embossed on them.
Senator Uzor Orji Kalu, some months ago, appeared on the floor of the Senate in a special attire aimed to campaign for the re-election of the president.
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He told newsmen that he was calling on the president to recontest. On several occasions some members and leaders of the All Progressives Congress (APC) have said that there’s no vacancy in Aso Rock Villa in 2027.
Such rhetoric is also being heard at the state level where supporters of current governors are saying to the opposition that there’s no vacancy in so and so government house in 2027.
The INEC is to blame for this outright disregard for laid down rules of engagement. Although the Commission comes out to cry blue murder and pretend as if it was pained by the goings-on, it would seem that it is deliberately adopting the “see nothing, say nothing, and do nothing” posture.
The Commission appears to be taken for granted by politicians because they seem not to have regard for the umpire any more.
It would seem that the Commission has so lost its respect in the polity to the point that many Nigerians are now saying “to hell with INEC.”
On the other hand, the INEC seems to have been emasculated by the powers that be to the point that it has lost its power to bite.
Many observers believe that the Commission may have been so compromised that it has no mind of its own anymore.
A nation with such an electoral umpire runs a huge risk of descending headlong into all manner of electoral heists which may ultimately lead to anarchy.
