The 2007 general election conducted by INEC under the supervision of Maurice Iwu is, perhaps, one of the most fraudulent in Nigeria’s electoral history.

Human Rights Watch said this about that election: ‘’Instead of guaranteeing citizens’ basic right to vote freely, Nigerian government and electoral officials actively colluded in the fraud and violence that marred the presidential polls.’’

Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, the beneficiary of the electoral sleaze, even admitted that the exercise was a travesty.

Really, the electoral process evolved from a ‘’garrison exercise’’ with the conduct of one of the freest and fairest elections in 2015 by INEC under the superintendence of Attahiru Jega.

Before Jega, ‎the electoral body was accorded the “credibility of a con artist”. But he changed all that. He brought a verisimilitude of integrity to the institution, and won trust as well as affection for the commission.

Jega left INEC with a surfeit of trust‎, having conducted an election in which a sitting president was defeated, and which was adjudged free, fair and credible by most Nigerians and international organisations.4

But this “trust” appears threatened going by the avalanche of sour allegations against the commission now.

The recent elections supervised by Mahmood Yakubu are a declension into a past of violence, fraud and garrison democracy. The 2019 general election, for example, was adjudged by international observers to be anything but free, fair and credible.

The EU said the election was ‘’overshadowed by systemic failings’’.

‘’The environment for this election has been difficult with cases of violence and intimidation,’’ it said.

As a matter of fact, the general election supervised by Yakubu in 2019 was in character like that which Iwu managed in 2007 – an electoral exercise of fraud, tears, sorrow and blood.

To say the least, the elections in Bayelsa and Kogi have been despairing – with widespread violence in the confluence state and in the ‘’glory of all lands’’.

READ MORE: https://thebelltimesng.com/2019/11/28/how-maurice-iwu-reincarnated-in-mahmood-yakubu-of-inec-by-fredrick-nwabufo/

One of the reasons why I gave up on Nigeria, all the gains made by jega have been wipe out by yakubu. A case of one step forward 5 steps backwards.