Sunday March
20, 2009 |
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This much is clear to me: Maurice Iwu,
the integrity-challenged chairman of the
(misnamed) Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) will not
conduct the
next round of elections in 2011. Sooner or later – but definitely before
2011 –
Mr. Iwu’s chums in the ruling Peoples Democratic Party will find a way
to ease
him out of the post he has thoroughly disgraced.
It would be wonderful if Mr. Iwu’s exit would herald credible elections
in 2011.
Sadly, that won’t be the case.
|
Iwu will leave his post, not
because the beneficiaries of his warped elections have seen the
light and become born-again believers in free and fair polls.
No, the PDP is not about to renounce electoral hanky panky as
its default mode. |
Some PDP
legislators have even rigged a
vote of confidence in Iwu |
|
The PDP has set itself the goal of
ruining Nigeria for another sixty years, or until the nation absolutely
collapses in a heap. No less an insider than the party’s current
national chairman, Vincent Ogbulafor, has disclosed this sixty-year
plot.
Why then would a party that can win only by rigging be in a hurry to
rusticate Iwu, a patented hand in incompetent elections? The simple
truth is that the pharmacist-turned-disastrous electoral umpire has
outlived his “rigging” usefulness. Iwu is like a drug whose expiry date
is long past. Iwu must go to enable the ruling party to rent another
rigging tool..
For me, the argument over Iwu’s continued chairmanship is actually a
strategic deflection. Both Mr. Umaru Yar’Adua and the PDP hierarchy know
two facts. One is
that Iwu’s image is so stinky that no domestic or international observer
will take seriously any elections conducted by the man in 2011. In fact,
should Iwu preside over the next round of elections, one should expect a
massive boycott of them by opposition parties. The other fact is that,
in a country where shame has lost its chastening power, there are
thousands willing to out-Iwu Iwu in the overseeing of electoral fraud.
That explains Yar’Adua’s insistence on retaining the power to choose the
chairman of the electoral commission. Whilst other political parties are
focusing on Iwu’s removal – a done deal – Yar’Adua and the PDP are
pretending that the issue is still contentious. Some PDP legislators
have even rigged a vote of confidence in Iwu. There are shadowy press
campaigns to burnish Iwu’s irreparable image.
Yet, the ruling party’s seeming haste to provide life-support for Iwu is
nothing less than a sly maneuver. It’s political cynicism at work. Once
the Iwu debate hits boiler point, one expects the ruling party to
suddenly “sacrifice” Iwu. Its officials will then boast that, since they
are “on ground” throughout the nation, they have decided to encourage
Iwu to go in order to deny the opposition grounds to whine or gripe
after being thrashed in 2011.
Iwu, in his moment of disgrace, can count on being feted by officials of
the party he “voted” into power. His name will appear in the list of
nominees for national honor. Some misdirected Catholic prelates will
summon him to the front pews and decorate him with a benighted
knighthood.. It’ll be a different story with the rest of us. Most
Nigerians will jeer Iwu; the man had no business accepting an umpire’s
job he had no moral spine or ethical funds to discharge.
Yet, just as the opposition and most Nigerians become euphoric over the
removal of a man who has come to epitomize electoral fraud, Yar’Adua
will quickly sneak in another stooge at INEC. Given its sixty-year
nightmare plan for Nigeria, the ruling party is going to ensure that
Iwu’s successor is as skilled and unabashed a rigging technologist as
the former occupant of the INEC seat.
Despite Iwu’s (almost) assured exit, one doesn’t foresee any scenario
that bodes well for the credibility and integrity of the 2011 elections.
Mr. Anthony Anenih recently served notice of the rigging tsunami to come
in two years. He implored God to “please grant President Yar'Adua good
health to complete his six remaining years.” Mr. Anenih is a retired
police officer who has parlayed a gift for opportunism and the “fixing”
of illicit political goals into stupendous material and political
fortune. The man does not speak idly. Nigerians had better grasp his
statement as a clear signal that the ruling party has already written
the results of the 2011 elections. Whether it’s Iwu or somebody else who
will “announce” the results to us hardly matters.
Nigerians are in this quandary in the first place because they opted to
abide the illegitimacies of the 2007 polls. As a beneficiary of one of
history’s worst rigged elections, Yar’Adua should not have been
permitted to set the agenda for electoral reform. If the man believed in
credible elections, he would have proved it by disavowing his office.
Iwu or no Iwu, the 2011 elections are already a chronicle of a sham
foretold.
