Election Challenges: Okutepa Suggests New Method For Choosing Nigeria’s Leaders

Since political thugs and their sponsors have made fair elections impossible and governments have not been able to think outside the box, Nigerians should meet at their villages and select representatives who would govern them, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Jibrin Samuel Okutepa, has suggested.

Okutepa, who is the founding Partner of J.S. Okutepa & Company, a law firm based in Abuja, observed that there is no need to waste humongous resources to organise elections in a country where democracy remains a mirage. He made this known in a statement yesterday.

Okutepa spoke against the backdrop of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) – highly acclaimed as good for credible elections – but which failed to upload results of the presidential election as expected on Saturday.

Okutepa said: “The ongoing selection, otherwise called election, is in point. Everyone is involved. No one can claim to be pure. Even those who have good intentions to be pure have people with impurity of heart and impunity around them.

“I have said before that while the introduction of BVAS is good, the human elements will undermine it. Thugs are at their best in these elections.

“Those who have duties and responsibilities to do what is right are either afraid of doing it or they have refused to do it due to commercial interest.

“INEC, as a body, is not independent as it ought to be. INEC does not have sufficient staff to man elections and polling stations. “The adhoc staff are heavily compromised Nigerians of Nigerian blood who are experts in Nigerians’ ways of doing things. There are no consequences for misbehaviours. How can we grow and develop with this kind of attitude?

“The political class does not want the will of the people to prevail. Given the crooked manner things are done and the fact that the will of the people are not respected, what actually is the need for election? Let us avoid waste of funds to organise elections.”