CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the Study

The Nigerian polity over the years has been replete with endemic electoral fraud, rigging and outright violence. Rather than embracing elections as one of the most important processes that facilitate peaceful transition of power and strengthen democratic institutions, they are seen as means of acquiring the spoils of democracy (Sule, 2009).

The electorate’s minds had been manipulated into believing the misconception that the candidate that spends much deserves their vote. Most of these public officials that buy their way into public office through the display of materials wealth spend virtually half of their tenure in office to cover up for the money they have spent making campaign promises which hardly come to reality and after that, they begin to oil the political machines in preparation for the next election. Consequently, citizens in recent times have become more cynical about governance as there seems to be no hope in the functioning of the political institutions in the country (Irabor, 2012).

Since independence the country processes witnessed massive electoral fraud and violence which has compromised the very ethics of liberal democracy inspite of several electoral reforms that have had no positive effect. And this predicament to democratization process in Nigeria has rather been on the increase and there is no evidence of any serious and sincere effort made to stop it from reaching unsavoury levels.

While a great deal of the problem confronting elections and electoral process in the nation’s democratic history can be linked to the electorates’ behavioural and attitudinal attitude, the bulk of the blame must also be placed on the institutions that are responsible for conducting elections in country (Longman, 2009:21). Experience have shown that if the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) can step away from political influence and move away from status quo where a political party dominates the constitution of drivers of INEC there is every tendency that there will be a better conduct of election in the future. Unfortunately, Nigeria’s experience has been that rather being non-partisan and independent of the executive, past electoral commission elections in the country have been tied to the apron strings of the incumbent executive. The independent National Electoral commission (INEC) like its past predecessors, has shown partially and gross incompetence in the discharge of its responsibilities. INEC’s inability to effectively conduct and administer elections and the electoral process in the country has been detrimental on the nation’s effort at instituting credible and sustainable democratic system.