THE ANC GOVERNMENT AND THE NIGERIAN ELECTIONS
Introduction
On Tuesday 29 May 2007, Umaru Yar’adua was inaugurated as the new Nigerian president despite there being a great deal of controversy over the credibility of the elections that put him in power.
Nigerian labour unions, including the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), the Trade Union Congress and the Joint Action Forum, instituted mass strikes and boycotted the inauguration ceremony with President of the NLC, Abdulwaheed Omar, stating that “labour would not fold its arms while self-serving and corrupt people entrusted with the responsibility of governance or conducting free and fair elections crash the ship of state.”
Domestic observers labelled the election results a “charade” and opposition parties have filed lawsuits seeking a court annulment of Nigeria's presidential elections, demanding another poll.
This criticism has not only been confined to Nigerians. A number of countries have voiced their concern over irregularities that occurred during the elections, with many of them calling for fresh elections to take place.
In stark contrast to all of this, one finds South Africa, whose position on the elections was determined by President Mbeki when he became the first foreign head of state publicly to congratulate Yar’adua on his victory and welcome him on a visit to South Africa.
When it comes to the Department of Foreign Affairs, it is often very difficult to determine exactly what the government’s position on anything in Africa is, exactly (usually because government’s position is designed not to compromise the ANC’s party political position – take Zimbabwe for example, who knows what government says behind closed doors).
Once again, this trend – of overlooking anti-democratic practices in favour of party political solidarity – has emerged with regard to the Nigerian elections. Take the recent response from the Department of Foreign Affairs to a DA parliamentary question on this issue, for example.
The DA’s question
The DA asked the minister of foreign affairs:
Whether with reference to the recent statement made by her department that South Africa would await the verdict of all election observer missions to Nigeria before pronouncing on that country’s elections, her department was aware of the fact that observer missions from the United States, the European Union and the regional West African bloc have criticised these elections; if not, what is the position in this regard; if so, (a) on what grounds does Government view these elections as having been free and fair, (b) what were the findings of the SA Independent Electoral Commission and (c) what were the reasons for the Government not sending its own election observer mission?
The department’s reply to the first part of the question - asking whether it was aware of the concerns expressed by other foreign powers regarding Nigeria’s elections - was yes.
For the record, some of those concerns included the following:
• The EU was of the opinion that the Nigerian elections fell short of basic standards and could not be considered credible, free and fair.
• The European Parliament, in line with this argument, recently passed a resolution urging the EU to withhold all financial aid to the Nigerian government until it held new elections.
• The USA also voiced its concern stating that it was deeply troubled by what American observers saw over the election weekend. The national security spokesman Gordon Johndroe stated that America had urged for free and fair elections, and that it was not sure that this was exactly what the people of Nigeria got.
So, in light of the above, what did the South African government have to say about the legitimacy of the e
| Posted on 8/6/2007
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