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Tag: electorate

  • Group urges electorate to vote wisely

    Group urges electorate to vote wisely

    A group, the Concerned People of Benin Nation (CPBN) has urged the Edo electorate to resist the temptation of electing a governor that will bring greater pains and retrogression from November 12 this year.

    Read Also: FIRS establishes anti-corruption unit to combat corruption

    The group, led by Prof. Amen Uhunmwangho, made the statement yesterday at a press conference in Benin City, the state capital. Uhunmwangho was accompanied by eight other eminent indigenes of the seven local governments that make up Edo South Senatorial District: Oredo, Ikpoba-Okha, Egor, Ovia Northeast, Ovia Southwest, Orhionmwon and Uhunmwonde.

    The group, also known as Umagba N’Edo, said: “September 21, 2024, Edo State governorship election offers our people the opportunity to interrogate the character of the candidates presented to the public for the poll. Political power is designed to improve society, create wealth, and guarantee prosperity for the people.”

  • Akeredolu to electorate: vote for APC candidates

    •Governor forgives Boroffice, Kekemeke, others

    Ondo State Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu has advised All Progressives Congress (APC) members in the state to vote for the party’s candidates in tomorrow’s presidential and National Assembly elections.

    This followed a contrary claim in some quarters that the government had mandated all political office holders, including local government chairmen, to work for the Action Alliance (AA).

    Akeredolu reportedly hinged his change of mind on the need to avoid confusing voters, which may affect President Muhammadu Buhari’s votes in the state.

    A statement by the Media Assistant to the Concerned Group of APC, Shina Adewale, said: “Governor Akeredolu, in a telephone conversation with some leaders opposing him, said as the Chancellor in the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion), he has forgiven Senator Ajayi Boroffice and others who worked against him.

    “I have to put my Christian faith to reality; we were bound to disagree and also agree in some situations.

    “As a leader, I must show exemplary leadership by doing the needful to ensure that our party, the APC, emerges victorious in the elections.

    “If Jesus can forgive our iniquities, who am I, an ordinary mortal being, not to let go in the interest of promoting our party?”

    Akeredolu was said to have urged party faithful to discountenance previous insinuations and instructions to vote for AA and directed Ondo State electorate to vote for APC in tomorrow’s elections.

    Reacting to the statement, the immediate and pioneer Chairman of APC in the state, Isaacs Kekemeke and former Deputy Governor Alli Olanusi said if the information was correct, Akeredolu must be commended for his statesmanship.

     

     

  • Vote Buhari for good governance, Razak urges electorate

    THE Grand Patron of Buhari/Osinbajo Mandate Group in Lagos State, Chief Lanre Razak, has said the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate, President Muhammadu Buhari, deserves re-election on February 16 to enable the party consolidate its developmental strides.

    He said the current war on corruption, massive development of the railways, especially the Lagos-Ibadan standard gauge which is nearly completion, the counter-insurgency campaign, growth in the economy and the revolution in the agricultural sector, are among the major programmes of the APC-led Federal Government that would receive more attention with President Buhari’s re-election.

    In a statement, yesterday in Ikeja, the state capital, Razak, a former Commissioner for Public Transportation and Balogun General of Epe, also hailed APC National Leader, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, for the mature manner he resolved the recent face-off between Governor Akinwunmi Ambode the House of Assembly on this year’s budget.

    The face-off paved the way for the presentation of the document by the governor.

    Razak said: “We members of the APC are enthused and want to commend the political sagacity of our great leader and former governor of Lagos State, Asiwaju Tinubu, for intervening promptly to resolve the misunderstanding between the two arms of government over the 2019 state budget. His swift resolution of the impasse facilitated the presentation of the budget by Governor Ambode to the Assembly.

    “The opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and some civil society organisations (CSOs), which wanted to make a political capital out of the impasse, were disappointed at the positive turn of event as the issue was amicably addressed and all Lagosians are grateful to the APC National Leader.”

     

     

  • Electorate warned against vote-buying

    A visually impaired cleric, Prophet Moses Muyideen Kasali has warned the electorate not to allow politicians to buy them over in the forthcoming general elections.

    Kasali, who is the founder of Hour of Mercy Prayer Ministry Worldwide, said in a chat with reporters in Ado-Ekiti on Sunday urged voters to be wise in making their choices at the polls.

    He advised voters to examine the character of all candidates and vote on the basis of competence and not because of money to be shared on the Election Day.

    Kasali, who further noted that selfishness largely remains the bane of Nigerian politics, said it was time Nigerians, politicians inclusive, began to imbibe the spirit of selflessness and patriotism and learn how to offer services to the country.

    He said: “There is need to put an end to the growing trend of vote-buying in the country. Vote-buying is synonymous to selling the development of the country, stagnating provision of infrastructure and discouraging better lives for the citizens.

    “Nigerians should be wise and regard the forthcoming general elections as opportunity to restore the country to the path of progress and development by voting right and ensuring that candidates who have genuine intentions to ensure growth and development of the country voted for.

    “It is also imperative that Nigerians return to the path of righteousness, seek the face of God and shun all divisive and corrupt tendencies for God to direct the affairs of the country.

  • Electorate not ripe for e-voting, says don

    Electorate not ripe for e-voting, says don

    Nigerian electorate is not ripe for electronic voting, a Professor of Political-Economics with Chukwuemeka Odomegwu Ojukwu University (COOU), Igbariam, Anambra, Chubah Ezeh, has said.

    Ezeh told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Enugu yesterday.

    The professor was reacting to the call for the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to implement electronic voting system in the country.

    He said if INEC wanted to go digital and be 100 per cent technology-driven, it must provide adequate infrastructure.

    “The issue of basic infrastructure like power supply must be addressed and it must not rely on generating sets. Without proper enlightenment, the average Nigerian is a novice to use electronic device beyond his personal phones,’’ he said.

    INEC, he said, must upgrade its staff to be computer compliant before the introduction of such a system.

    According to him, electronic voting is not bad in itself; it shows a forward progress.

    “But how can one be sure of the result being intact and not subjected to some technological manipulations and cyber interference from external actors and countries just as the case between United States and Russia at present,’’ he said.

  • Our timid electorate and Rochas Okorocha’s priapism of lusts

    Our timid electorate and Rochas Okorocha’s priapism of lusts

    You could be forgiven for thinking Rochas Okorocha, Imo State governor, suffers priapism of lusts; that curious hankering that incites a man’s ambivalence towards his innate moral constructions – relative morality to be precise.

    If Okorocha truly lives and breathes the excellence and native wisdom he projects, he just might understand the dangers of persistently yielding to crooked impulses.

    His erection of the statues of former Liberian and South African presidents, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf and Jacob Zuma respectively, in his state, trumps his antecedents and strikes a wrong chord across social and political circuits in a state grappling with poverty and government inefficiency.

    At first glance, the statues excite feelings of wonder and revolt. Wonder at its patron’s curious lusts and revulsion at the true import of the effigies in the state.

    While controversy raged over the alleged billion naira effigy, Okorocha struggled to dispel notions of his alleged profligacy in commissioning the statues, hinting that the cost is less than a billion. He accused opposition parties in the state of inciting the controversy through shady insinuations.

    He particularly condemned the Socioeconomic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) for calling for a probe of his government over the statues. In a statement by his Chief Press Secretary (CPS), Sam Onwuemeodo, in Owerri, Okorocha challenged SERAP to name any law stopping his activities. He hinted that the statues might not have been funded from the government’s purse?

    Okorocha initially claimed to erect the statues in celebration of leaders, who had through “selfless efforts” contributed to the development of the state, Nigeria and the African continent.

    “With the statues, they have been inducted into the Imo Hall of Fame and have received the highest award in the state called the Imo Merits Award “ said one of the governor’s lackeys, according to a recent media report.

    Following the humiliating resignation of South Africa’s president, Jacob Zuma, over corrupt allegations, Nigerians have been wondering what will become of his statue erected in Imo state.

    It would be recalled that sometimes last year, Okorocha immortalized Zuma with a gigantic statue; a street was even named after Zuma in the state and he was also given a chieftaincy title.

    Given that Zuma was forced out of office by his own party ANC, for being corrupt. Has Okorocha immortalized corruption in Imo state? Has the man with native wisdom, gone the way of the madding crowd to institutionalise sleaze in his native state?

    This of course is discussion pursuable in subsequent forum.

       To be continued…

  • Towards a better electorate

    A great majority of Nigerians of commonplace roots live through each day without ever contemplating or criticizing their living conditions. They find themselves born into dehumanizing squalor or somewhat indecent circumstances and they accept such sordidness as their fate.

    Almost as impulsively as the beasts of the wild, they seek the satisfaction of the needs of the moment, without much forethought and consideration that by sufficient endeavor, they just might improve their living conditions.

    However, a certain percentage guided by personal ambition, consciously strive in thought and will to attain more privileged status that remains the exclusive preserve of more fortunate members of the society; but very few among these are concerned enough to secure for all, the advantages which they seek for themselves. This explains the number of self-centred and treacherous human rights activists, women’s rights activists, journalists and columnists parading our streets.

    Very few men are indeed capable of that kind of love that drives martyrs to persistently rebel against glaring social evils in the interest of less fortunate members of the society. But there exists a few however, that are truly bothered by the impoverishment of their fellow citizens.

    These few, driven by compassion tirelessly seek, first in thought and then in action, for some way of escape; some new system of society by which life may become richer, more joyful and devoid of avertable evils that mars the present. But surprisingly, such men oftentimes, fail to curry the support of the very victims of the injustices they wish to remedy.

    Greater segments of the Nigerian population are hopelessly ignorant, apathetic from excess of toil and disillusionment, apprehensive through the imminent danger of instantaneous chastisement by the holders of power, and morally defective owing to the loss of self-respect resulting from their degradation. To excite among such classes any conscious, deliberate effort in pursuit of general improvement of the status quo proves basically a hopeless task, as antecedents of such efforts have proven.

    Thus despite our claims to higher education, sophistication and relative rise in the standard of comfort among wage-earners in the country, the Nigerian electorate have failed woefully to achieve better living conditions and a better society.

    Nigerians have a problem with differentiating between appropriate and inappropriate political behavior.  That is why the nation’s democratic experiment like any other system of governance practicable by us was doomed from the start.

    What exactly has democracy offered? A 4-1-9 progressive plan that booms circumspectly like it had been doctored as part of a cold-war era propagandist scheme?

    The average Nigerian is no more electable than the leadership he endures yet he loves to speak truth to power even as he functions simultaneously to smother his own voice.

    No man; be he a distinguished columnist, lawyer, soldier, or public officer in any office can command the tides of history. The few that appear to have done so–the Napoleon’s, Caesar’s, Hitler’s–were really nothing more than the most capable at making it appear that they command the tides, when in fact they were simply skimming along with them.

    Thus the need for the Nigerian working class to consciously evolve in thought and will in pursuit of a more balanced social order. Such conscious evolution could only be achieved by a re-orientation in scholarship and purification of thought and action.

     

    • To be continued…
  • Let electorate decide Buhari’s reelection fate, says Kashamu

    Let electorate decide Buhari’s reelection fate, says Kashamu

    Senator Kashamu Buruji has cautioned those advising President Muhamadu Buhari not to run for re-election to allow the   electorate to determine his fate.

    He said the only way for the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) to make a headway is for its leaders to ensure that aggrieved members get justice.

    Kashamu, in an interview, said: “Every Nigerian is entitled to his opinion.  Freedom of speech is one of the essentials of democracy. The President is constitutionally entitled to seek re-election and that is undeniable. The electorate should be the ones to decide whether they want him to continue in office or not since the issue of satisfactory performance is relative and might be subjective. For instance, it is common knowledge that the President promised to deliver on three things – to fight corruption, insecurity and fix our economy. Now, the jury is out as to whether he has delivered on the three programmes. But, no one can deny that he has blocked many leakages in our treasury through the implementation of the Treasury Single Account (TSA), the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS), Government Financial Management and Information System and the Efficiency Unit of the Federal Ministry of Finance, among others.

    “The Federal Government has also decimated Boko Haram. Unlike before, the insurgents are no longer in control of any Nigerian territory. Again, although not all the Chibok girls are back, a good number of the girls have returned and back in the warm embrace of their families. While those in support of the President’s re-election could say that his anti-corruption war has helped to stabilise our economy and saved it from recession, those against it could argue that he is fighting corruption and insecurity at the expense of the economy.

    “Others could say that though the administration is fixing critical infrastructure, there is no stomach infrastructure and that it is those who are alive that can use the infrastructure. But, there are those who also believe that fixing the critical infrastructure will guarantee stomach infrastructure on a more sustainable basis.

    “In my candid opinion, integrity is of the essence in all human endeavours and I am yet to see one person who can question the integrity of Mr. President. This, to me, is a very important ingredient in leadership. This might have informed the recent choice of President Buhari by the African Union (AU) as its anti-corruption champion.”

    Kashamu praised the Seriake Dickson-led PDP reconciliation panel for starting well.

    “The committee is doing its very best in reaching out to all the aggrieved members of the party with a view to ironing out all the grey areas. And I think that is a very commendable initiative,” he said.

    “We are talking and I hope that at the end of the day, justice will be done in such a manner that none of the contending forces will be shortchanged,” the senator said.

    The senator criticised Ekiti State Governor Ayo Fayose for “running in and out of courts to enforce what he called his rights. Yet, the same person can gleefully deny others their rights to the constitutionally-guaranteed term of office.”

    “He is going nowhere. In fact, no reasonable Presidential candidate will pick a cantankerous and inordinately ambitious person as his running mate.

    “Any Presidential candidate who picks Fayose as his running mate endangers his life should he win.”

  • Appeal to Rivers’ electorate

    SIR: Many have asked if this is the type of democracy Nigerians hungered after in the 1990s. The fate of the people of Rivers State now rest with them, as they prepare for the Senatorial elections on December 10. It will be ridiculous, if the voters in that state, allow themselves to be persuaded to elect candidates based on the enticement of cooked rice, or bags of rice and sundries. That would be an insult to the people and by extension all Nigerians.

    They should have nothing to do with the politics of deceit and avoid been passive? This country is in ruins because the voter has made poor use of their influence and authority and what has happened? The result is the endless gulf between haves and have-nots.

    Today some office-seekers being proactive of their political ambition, set in motion a resemblance of service to the people whilst in reality it’s a scheme to clinch political power and when this is achieved they watch citizens die from diseases that care could prevent. It is now common for people to beg on the streets for alms, and in the newspapers for donations to bring medical care to their loved ones.

    And as they do, those elected on their promise of Utopia continue to fail the voters in their pursuits of self-interest. People of Rivers state in Nigeria today, are bleeding and wonder how long they would have to wait for their modest dreams to come true?

    Now is the time for them to look at the candidates eyeball-to-eyeball and ask them what they can do to stem the tide of rural-urban migration which has only added to the congestion and the problems of high-density living where infrastructure and services remain under-developed.

    Now is the time to ask them what plans they have to expand access to quality education? We have our public schools in Nigeria, unsupported and decaying with unqualified teachers and lack of funding.

    And this remains the status quo where only the poor send their children to learn in these schools. Ask them what plans they have to lift you out of poverty, to give you decent healthcare, quality life and meet all of your needs.

    Do not fall victim easily to promises made, so sincerely, hand-on-heart by those who seek your votes? Seek instead the candidate who can firmly protect your homes, provide education for your children and regular income for breadwinners.

    There is no better time to change Rivers State than now and the burden of change rests on you (voters).  This time, let voters not be swayed by the same promises that deliver nothing.

    Let voters not be seduced again. Let them not sell their precious votes for a handful of coins scattered to the masses. They are worth less than the coinage from which they are made.

    Fellow Rivers voters, do not allow a single vote to be wasted on those who will only fail you again. They do not deserve your precious vote. Not this time around. Remember: Only the small-minded keep repeating the same mistakes and hope for better outcomes.

     

    • Simon Abah,

    Port Harcourt.

  • Abraham to electorate: vote according to your conscience

    Ondo State All Progressives Congress (APC) chieftain Olusegun Ab raham yesterday urged the people to vote according to their conscience on Saturday.

    He acknowledged the division and lack of reconciliation in the opposition party, lamenting that the post-primary crisis was not properly resolved by the party leadership.

    Abraham, an aspirant during the controversial shadow poll, told reporters in Lagos that reconciliation was not contemplated by the party, despite the protests that trailed the shadow poll.

    Urging the people to exercise their franchise, he said: “With the situation on ground, I have made up my mind to vote according to my conscience.

    “I will urge the people to vote according to their conscience.

    “I will urge my supporters to vote according to their conscience. And remember that you are responsible to God. So, you must vote according to your conscience.”

    Abraham said the post-primary crisis had changed the perception of the people who thought that the APC was the solution to their problems.

    He added: “Since the crisis of the primary election, the morale of the people has gone down.

    “You cannot see the enthusiasm or expectation that a new government is coming. The people are confused. They are demoralised, irrespective of what some people are saying.

    “We need to stress that fact. We don’t know who will  deliver the state from its bad economic situation.

    “We pray the state will have an opportunity to elect  good leadership that will resolve its economic problems and transform the state. We need transformation in Ondo State.”

    Abraham refrained from commenting on the rumour that Asiwaju Bola Tinubu had directed  aggrieved aspirants to support the candidate of the Alliance for Democracy (AD), Olusola Oke.

    He said: “ I have heard so much about the rumour. But, what I will say is that I am not Tinubu’s spokesman.

    “So, if anybody wants any information about that, he should try to see his press secretary. He will enlighten you on the issue.”

    Abraham revisited the controversial primary that has polarised the state chapter, saying that the problem was compounded by the lack of genuine reconciliation.

    He said: “It was not contemplated. It was completely ignored. It was as if all they have done was a fait accompli. They have contempt for the people. Before the primary, the party was in good shape. The party was up and doing. Series of meetings were held with the aspirants.

    “President Muhammadu Buhari convened a meeting with us. There was another meeting between the aspirants and the National Executive Committee (NEC). The SGF addressed us and asked us to maintain calm.

    “After the primary, when the crisis erupted, it was expected that the party will call the aspirants together, especially the four or five aggrieved contestants. The party did not do that.

    “We expected that the President would intervene. It was not forthcoming. It was like they had done what they wanted to do and so, the process of reconciliation was ignored.

    “When they insisted on their position, the people had made up their minds. Well, we have to thank the governor of Kebbi State. He is a gentlemen.

    “One or two others intervened, but in a clandestine way. They believed that they had taken their own decision and it was left for you to team up with them. That is the spirit with which they have viewed it.

    “That’s why they have not been able to make any move about reconciliation.

    Abraham added: “ For me, it is very simple. You must follow the process of reconciliation.  If you follow it, there will be no problem. There will be no fight. There is nothing you gain by fighting.

    “If we are united, it will be easy for us to win the battle. But, if we are in disunity, the battle will not be easy for us to win.

    “We must have a process of reconciliation, which we will call genuine reconciliation.

    “This Ondo experience is a test for the party. This is the mechanism that is lost in the APC.

    “As a loyal member, I have suggested that we need  reconciliation mechanism in the APC.

    “I have faith in genuine reconciliation. In any case, genuine reconciliation must be based on truth and justice, not on fallacy,  deceit,  stealing or power ego.

    “If you want reconciliation, you must be humble. We must come to the table with clean hands. We must correct the wrongs.

    “These are the elements of reconciliation. It is the same in the country.”