Voting For The Right Reasons.

When I boarded the Sienna bus heading to my State capital, Awka during the 2015 general elections, I never anticipated that the lessons and experiences would change my perception on civic responsibility in Nigeria’s electoral process. That experience and recent ills of governance and failures of political elites to keep up with numerous campaign promises is helping me connect the dots on who the key players are, and how citizens can influence the outcome of elections, if they vote right.

Whilst serving as a Senior Presiding Officer (SPO), in my polling unit in Awka South, I closely monitored voters and what inspires them to vote for who they vote for and why they vote for them. I noticed that artisans, laborers, market women, small business owners etc were the highest number of voters that came out to cast their votes. One could justify that because perhaps they reside in those areas. But I will say maybe they trust that their vote counts, that they understand the importance of voting to improve their well being.

My third observation was that despite vote buying occurrences, it wasn’t really easy swaying these category of people to vote in favour of a candidate they don’t believe in. They would argue, they would shout and still prove their rationale for choosing their candidate. However, the competence of the preferred candidate is relative.

I overheard a young lady probably in her thirties inquiring from a young man why he thinks his candidate is the best and deserves to be in power, He responded- “during his campaign, he shared several items, food stuffs, money, infact nne, i can’t name them all; whereas this other man was so stingy that he only speaks big grammar, na grammar we come chop”. Immediately, there was chatter and laughter from anyone who heard him. Many supported him and probably shared his opinion. By this time, accreditation had ended and my attention shifted back to my reason for being there.

But the young man’s words kept echoing in my ears, what mulled on my mind was - what if we vote for the right reasons? Maybe, we will have more competent leaders. How do we alter the behavioral pattern of voters at the grassroots? Most people at the grassroot are not digitally empowered, are not on twitter and appear to be socially disconnected. Some do not even know how the budgetary allocation for their communities nor the performance of their elected officials vis-a-vis the budgetary allocation for their community.

Alot has been done by groups to enlighten people and there is still a lot to be done. Continuous voter education should target altering mindsets, reorientation and building a solution mindset; ensuring voter preferences go beyond sentiments and that citizens understands the link between how each casted vote leads to completion or abandonment of yet to be implemented primary healthcare centers in their community.

Continuous voter education that instills some sense of duty, that can make people constructively interrogate whomever their preferred candidate is, ascertain their political agenda and history of accomplishments especially with respect to previous campaign promises.

To change our status quo, a great share of work falls on religious organizations. Karl Marx in one of his works said “religion is the opium of the masses” and in this context, religious leaders should integrate both civic and political education into their doctrine to ensure the same strategy they use for sermons are used in influencing public action to interrogate political regimes that do not exist for the good of the common man.

I think that voting for the right reasons will allow us base our political preferences on the principle of meritocracy not on party superiority or religion, not even on ethnic affiliations. For the love of our great country, we must save Nigeria, uphold her honour and glory by ensuring that each little choice we make is made with such great love that posterity will always remember.

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