The Sun News On-line

A chieftain of the Action Congress (AC) and former gubernatorial candidate in Ekiti State, Mr Kayode Fayemi has asked the Federal Government to draw useful lessons from Ghana’s transparent and peaceful presidential elections that enthroned Professor John Atta-Mills as the current president of that country.

He described the Ghanaian election as an eye opener for Nigeria, hailing both the electoral commission and the security agencies for not interfering in the matters of elections, thus allowing the choice of the electorate to prevail.

Fielding questions from aviation correspondents in Lagos on Tuesday prior to his departure to Accra to witness the inauguration ceremony of the new Ghanaian President, Fayemi who was in company of AC’s National Publicity Secretary, Lai Mohammed, explained that Nigeria needs a man of integrity to lead the nation’s Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), pointing out that anything short of that will spell doom for the nation since the ruling party would keep manipulating such an individual for its own selfish interest.

He noted that Nigeria’s presidential elections was a huge shame as the police and military were used to cajole the electorate and in some ugly cases like in Ekiti State, were used to snatch ballot boxes and other election materials, thus messing up the polity.

He hailed the courage of the Ghana Election Commission for doing what is right by allowing the votes of the people count, even as he affirmed that the desire of the people to defend their votes and ensure it democratically counts speaks volumes of the patriotism of the nationals.

“The electoral commission of Ghana has proven to be genuinely independent, transparent and credible as well as professional in its activities. The body language of the presidency and the way the process has gone, it was not manufactured bandwagon. I have consistently monitored the way the Ghanaians have organized themselves in the last 16 years. There are four or five lessons Nigeria could draw from the Ghanaian elections. The way the presidency behaved, the way the judiciary behaved, the way the electoral commission behaved, the way the political parties themselves behaved and the way the electorate at large behaved.

“First, they have a president that was not committed to a do or die mentality. They have presidency that was more committed to the survival of democracy, even though it was his party that lost the election. He still said on the dot of 12.00 of January 7, 2009, I am handing over to the new president of Ghana,” he said.

The AC chieftain further explained that the judiciary in Ghana was introduced into the latest contest, “but immediately, it refused to grant that injunction, to stop the process. It said elections must go ahead because the nation was more important than litigation. They have an electoral commission whose chairman was consistent, transparent and did not declare result even when it was only 50,000 constituents that had not voted.

It was clear that the result was going to go to the opposition party, but he refused to declare it. Unlike Nigeria’s last election, Mr Iwu declared the result even before results were announced in some states. Even the political party that was ruling did not have the arrogance of treating the electorate with contempt of saying they are going to be in power for 60 years, not on account of performance in government, but it was the party that controls the apparatus of power and is ready to intimidate, harass and distort the process.

“Finally, the greatest credit must go to the voting population in Ghana, who decided to protect their votes at the last minute, when there was going to be some form of manipulation. We saw what they did. They all went to the electoral commission, to wait for the dubious person that will distort the process and nobody did that. We must give credit to the security agencies, they refused to allow themselves to be used to distort the electoral process,” said.