Elections

It is Saturday afternoon one thirty: First election Day here in Nigeria.  Nick has just received a sms to say Monday will be a holiday.  Why?  Because the election has been postponed.  Why? Because some the election papers did not reach some points in time, so they postponed the whole election.  Sounds simple…but it is not.

This election has been announced in September and the organizing committee assured everyone that it will take place in January.  Nobody believed that.  Anyhow it is now April and everything is in place.  Or so they thought.

This is the African country with the highest population count and a proper registration of its inhabitants has not been yet done.  Therefore the speculation that the population count is somewhere between 130 and 150 million people.  The people migrate across borders as well. 

An election registration was to take place in January.  The process turned out to be so complicated that despite having days off standing in queues many Nigerians never managed to get registered.  Two of our staff of four failed and now cannot vote.  (Secretly I suspect they might see that as a mixed blessing.) In spite of that they have over seventy million voters registered – about three times the number of South African registered voters.

The plan was that there would be three election Saturdays in a row.  The first today would have been the election of the government.  Next Saturday they will vote for the president and the following Saturday is to be the election for the different state governments.  That means they have to queue for three Saturdays in a row.  The planned process for today was that the people could start queuing at about seven thirty in the morning, but they have to be in the queue by twelve thirty.  Anyone not in the queue by then cannot vote.  Then the voting starts and the queues can move forward and hopefully give everyone a chance to vote by ten tonight.   Now they have to go and stand in queues again on Monday!!!.

Not only that, but the whole country is declared a no-movement day.  If you are not at the voting point you may not move anywhere.  All the shops are closed and all the borders to the country are closed.  And now they are going to do all that again on Monday!!!! And next week and the following week!!!!

Sunday afternoon, just heard that the first election day has now been postponed to next Saturday and the other election days will move on one each..  The problem is that two cities did start voting yesterday and now they have to reprint the voting papers.  Simple? No.  Over seventy million papers for the first day have to be printed in China and shipped here.  (Just imagine three times that amount of papers for the whole election process – a decimation of the tree population on mother earth)  The tender for the printing has only been awarded a week before the elections and now the printers complain they cannot finish it in time.  Can you blame them?

Monday:  Nick saw the election paper at his office today and it is full of errors!  Slap dash that how things are done in Nigeria.

I guess it is easy to criticize, but I would not want to organize this election for anything in the world.  The organizing committee worked very hard at it and a fortune has been spent on technical equipment and training of electoral officials.  Security has been put on high alert at polls and elsewhere as there are proof and rumors of political candidates who stock piled arms in catches.  Everyone is nervous.  But they are desperate to have free and fair elections.  I tried to find reasons for their election struggle: sheer numbers?  Not so, says Nick, India has over 1.2 billion voters and they can do it.

We and I guess most other expats will be spending a day watching TV in cool air-conditioned homes as it is blistering hot outside. And now the same is to happen the next three Saturdays.  Not that we complain too much, There will be cricket world cup final, rugby, the Epic Cape Mountain bike race and the swimming pool outside.  I guess it will be pretty much the same the next few weeks.



Never a dull moment.  Friday night come and “no-move” day started at 10pm.  About that time our lights flickered and the electricity vanished.  The way it went off gave Nick an idea it is not the usual outage.  We prepared ourselves for a whole weekend without power as it is “no-movement-day”.  Worst of all our gas ran out that Friday.  Therefore no coffee…and on top of it, it was our anniversary.  Lying in bed the next morning trying to figure out what we were going to do in the heat, no coffee, no TV, no  Pc’s, no restaurant dinner, etc and suddenly all the lights went on.  Cheers!  Heard later the week that there was a fire in the generator room.





Some time that morning a bomb went off somewhere in Abuja and about eight people died, and there were a few other skirmishes but they declared the election a success and relatively trouble free, even though some states still did not have papers and will have to do this election together with the last day of elections.  There was also a report of 117 ballot boxes that have been snatched, and a few more reports of rigging but overall they are pleased with how it went.  A surprising number of high power politicians have been voted out, including the speaker and it looks like the ruling party has lost a healthy amount of seats, wich bodes well for future parliament.  However the real dogfight is happening this coming Saturday…the presidential election.  The question is not so much who is going to be elected but rather if Goodluck Jonathan is going to make it or not.

On that note I will leave you.  Someone asked to see where we live.  As we are virtually under house arrest for the election I thought now a good time to show our abode.





The Ancestors Court from Osun Crescent



The gate from our second story balcony







In front of our building





<>

The swimming pool