Assessing INEC’s Failure to Conduct a Free, Fair, and Credible 2023 Presidential Election: Evaluating the Consequences

Abstract

The paper attempts to examine critically the gross failure of the independent National Election Commission (INEC) in conducting a free, fair and credible election in the most recent Nigeria’s 2023 Presidential poll vis-à-vis its attendant consequences on the Nigerian citizens. The paper adopts the qualitative method of data collection and analysis to get at its findings. Thus, election is one of the most essential ingredients of democracy in both the developed and developing countries of the globe, but its conduct in Nigeria has still remained problematic to democratic governance., hence, the credibility of any democratic election in the world stems from the transparency of the electoral process and trustworthiness of the electoral umpire. However, it could be recalled that since the dawn of democracy in Nigeria in 1999, the country has experienced one electoral issue or the other ranging from the former president Olusegun Obasanjo’s administration up to the present-day government of Bola Ahmed Tinubu. Regrettably, judging from the February 2023 Presidential poll conducted by INEC, it was observed by Nigerians that, the election that brought Tinubu into power was marred by myriads of electoral abnormalities such as election thuggery/violence, political assassination, voters’ intimidation, vote buying, mutilation of result sheets and ballot snatching, etc. The paper argues that despite spending the sum of three hundred and five billion naira (N305b) in conducting the election, INEC, still shamefully failed to discharge its constitutional obligation of conducting free, fair and credible polls. The paper concludes that, this unhealthy development has indeed eroded the people’s trust on INEC now and in the future elections. The paper finally canvases for a holistic overhauling of the decayed institution in order to create a liberal democratic society for all Nigerians through a political revolution.