Crunch time for Jega’s INEC

“He is a fool whose sheep run away twice.” Ashanti proverb.

Funny thing about time. It changes everything, and it lets everything stay the same. When Professor Attahiru jega was appointed chairman of INEC, he received quite possibly the most genuine and widespread demonstranstions of acclaim and support. Coming from the spectacularly unspeakable performance of Professor Manrice Iwu, anyone in that position was bound to be a huge improvement on the standards set by the 2007 elections. But Jega came in with a solid image of an activist with an independent mind and a clean record. Civil society and labour led the chorus line to announce him as one of their own, and sold him to Nigerians as a new face that will bring integrity and competence into the electoral process. The media lined up behind a familiar face who had a reputation that was strong enough to belie being seen as Jonathan’s errand boy. Even President Jonathan had his day over Jega, and to date, he constantly reminds the world that Jega's and his victory are evidence that our elections are better managed under him.

No chairman of INEC started with stronger support and goodwill than Jega. That popular acclaim gave Jega huge powers and leverage within INEC and in his relations with political parties and government. He got virtually everything he wanted, but most important of all, he got trust and funding. His colleagues in the Commission showed glimpses of integrity and sound records of achievement, the type you could rely on to build strong bonds at the very top to withstand mischief and greed. Everything, it appeared, was available to Jega to lead the commission in conducting the best elections in 2011. A nation which expected so much had little appetite for failure or excuses, so a few organizational hiccups and demands for more funds were treated as evidence that the new leadership wanted to get everything right.

It must have taken Jega only a few weeks to discover that there was a lot more to INEC than its leadership. Elections are planned, but not conducted by INEC leaders in Abuja. Regular and ad hoc staff basically determined the quality of elections, and these have long been meticulously studied and compromised long before Jega and his team at the top came on board. A most vital component of the election process, the voters’ register, has long been pocketed by staff who know all about its weaknesses. Every stage of the election process is vulnerable to manipulation, and the staff of the Commission and politicians with specialized and intimate relationships with them have a very detailed knowledge of where to tweak it. 

People who live just for and around elections are bound to have deep and exclusive knowledge around logistics, sensitive materials, deployment of staff, distribution of materials, relations with security personnel, time management and abuse, manipulation of the polling and collation stages and post-election litigations. They will not be too eager to hand this over to leaders who will be there for an election or two. They will be particularly reluctant to roll over and give up lucrative and rare opportunities to make hay by changing attitudes and dispositions to meet standards of new leaders with transparent commitment to conduct credible elections. These were Jega’s first albatross, and he still carries them around in spite of commendable efforts to affect internal changes to improve quality, competence and integrity. 

It also may have downed on him not long after he embarked on the mission to change the way elections are conducted that his team of National and Resident Electoral Commissioners are substantially part of his problem. Political appointees that they are, many have deeply – embedded partisan interests and dubious personal credentials. Elections provide rare opportunities to return favours and make huge amounts of money, and Commissioners exercise massive powers to procure materials, hire and deploy staff and determine outcomes of elections.

It is, to say the least, foolhardy, and at worst dangerous, to antagonize both colleagues at the very top and regular staff of the Commission by creating the impression that you can conduct elections without their usual pivotal roles. This is not saying that it should not, or cannot be done. Indeed, the attempts made by Jega in bringing in senior academics to serve as Returning officers was an effort in that direction, but a wholesale assault on entrenched and institutionalized corruption require a lot more than tinkering with a few personnel in the heat of elections. Significantly, you need the solid support of your colleagues at the top to deal with mischief and machinations of staff. You also need access and effective control over key elements such as the voters register and all sensitive election materials. Too much centralization alienates too many people and creates a wider pool of hostility. Delegation without an effective monitoring system defeats the whole purpose of the attempt to change.

At the most intense moments in the planning and conduct of election, the most lonely soul must belong to chairmen of INEC. Jega must have gone through just about every tribulation anyone can go through. Elections were poorly organized by people he relied on to improve them. He postponed elections because printers failed to meet deadlines. Massive grievances around results and the worst post-election riots in the history of the nation left Jega and the Commission virtually in the same spot they were before the 2011 election: the midwives of elections which deepened the crises of democracy in Nigeria since 1999.

Jega has the unprecedented opportunity, protected by the constitution,  to conduct two general elections. Ordinarily, he would have learned all the right lessons, and in between the two elections, he would have fixed most of the inadequacies of the   first so that the second will be markedly better. Even his worst critics will not say he did not try. He put the Commission through some of its most comprehensive internal changes, affecting personnel, processes and attitudes. He stepped on sacred toes and made old enemies at the top even more bitter. He attempted to demonstrate his independence and the Commission’s capacity to take difficult decisions in the manner the APC merger was affected, and PDM emerged as a party. He used every opportunity to remind the nation that politicians, not INEC, determined the quality of elections.

But Jega’s most ardent loyalists will also acknowledge that he has failed to deliver where it mattered most: in the conduct of elections. Key elections in Ondo and Edo States were more about the staying power of incumbents than about significant variations in performance levels. Where flashes of progress were seen, they are swallowed by spectacularly poor outings: in Imo, Delta and most recently, Anambra.

Those who wonder whether Jega is progressing or regressing will be pardoned for their confusion, but that question alone is worrying. Should Jega’s INEC in 2013 be conducting the type of election which it admits has been compromised in part by its own staff? Should we have the type of uproar which is trailing the Anambra elections this close to critical timelines in the planning for the 2015 elections? Are politicians getting worse and INEC getting better, are we witnessing a degeneration in the levels and standards of conduct of both politicians and INEC? Is it even possible to fall below the standards set by the on-going drama in the PDP and the quarrels which trail Anambra?

It is fair to warn Jega that he is setting off the alarms even among his friends. The nation cannot continue to tolerate and overlook the failings of his Commission on the grounds that it is being led by a good man with his heart in the right place. The 2015 elections are quite possibly the most crucial this nation will go through, given unfolding circumstances and events. They will push our democratic system to dangerous breaking points, and only the manner INEC manages the elections will determine whether we lose it all, or recover massive amounts of lost ground. Jega has three options: resign, allow himself to be impeached or fix INEC. Failure to radically improve the manner INEC manages elections is not an option.