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Jega Warns Of Looming Disintegration Of Nigeria, Defends Deployment Of Soldiers During Elections
The former Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Prof. Attahiru Jega, has warned that Nigerians needed to do more to avert the disintegration prediction of Nigeria by the CIA.
Jega recalled that the CIA had predicted that Nigeria was going to disintegrate after 2015 general election but was averted by the then President Goodluck Jonathan when he accepted defeat.
The ex-chairman disclosed this while delivering a key note address at a conference on ‘20 Years of Democracy’, organised by TELL magazine on Wednesday in Abuja.
Jega said “The CIA thought that 2015 was the do-or-die period for Nigeria, that there would not be a Nigeria in the way you know after the 2015 General Elections. That has come and passed but I think if we do not take care, a lot of these predictions will come to pass. That is why we need to do quite a lot, much more than we have ever done in order to protect the integrity of the electoral process before 2023.”
In the same vein, the former INEC boss defended the deployment of soldiers during elections. Stressing that, the soldiers were deployed as a result of the security challenges the nation was confronted with.
He said “A lot has been said about the deployment of security during elections but we should recognise the fact that in Nigeria, we are faced with systemic security challenges. The presence of security is to ensure that the people have the peace of mind to come out to vote freely. The most important thing is to ensure that the security deployed is impartial and non-partisan. They should be professional in their conduct.”
Jega sited lack of trust in the electoral process as motive behind the low turn out of voters in the last general elections.
He said “Perhaps, the clearest evidence of this loss of trust and confidence in the electoral process is the declining voter turnout in elections since 1999. The reported data of voter turnout as a percentage of registered voters for elections are 52.3 per cent (1999), 69.1 per cent (2003), 57.3 per cent (2007), 55.4 per cent in 2011, 44 per cent in 2015 and 37 per cent in 2019.”
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