Richard Enyoghasu
Prominent activists under the umbrella of Think-Tank Democracy have expressed concerns as there are rumours to install an interim government instead of installing the 2023 president elect, Bola Tinubu.
The activists, which included, Prof. Lucky Akaruese, Chairman; Prof. Sylvester Odion Akhaine, Secretary; Debo Adediran; Abiodun Sowunmi and Joe Igbokwe, recently made their thought clear at a press conference held in Lagos, adding that the thought of interim government shows that Nigerians have forgotten how miserable lives was before democracy.
Mr Adediran reminded the nation thag they fought against the military and they are ready to defend democracy again. While Akhaine said that no election in Nigeria has been free and fair, “but the election has come and gone. A winner has been declared. If anyone feels otherwise he or she should follow the due process by going to court.”
According to the chairman of the group, Prof Akaruese; “The recently concluded 2023 general elections have unleashed worrisome currents. The elections were underlined by electoral problems that are not new to our landscape and have been central to electoral reforms in our bid to overcome them and bring transparency to bear on the quality of our democracy.
“Despite the above discontents of the process, somehow, actors at play have won some forms of victory. The leading opposition parties won some elective positions other than the presidency. To be sure, there are noticeable positive developments in the process that we should run with and further transform. One of them is the magic of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) to the effect that it negates every act of over-voting and moderates the inclination towards over-voting and outright manufacture of election results.
“The call for an interim government has gained attraction following the outcome of the 2023 election. But unbeknown to many it has been on the agenda of many anti-democratic elements in the polity to truncate the current democratic process. Truly, a segment of the pipers of the interim government contraption feels the need to resolve the national question before proceeding further in our democratic march in ways that clear, once and for all, the bottlenecks to our democratic growth and national development.”
