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Sunday, 29 March 2015
The world is watching Nigeria — Head, EU delegation
The Head of European Union Delegation in
Nigeria, Michel Arrion, in this interview with
ADELANI ADEPEGBA, challenges Nigerians to
uphold their status as the biggest democracy in
Africa
-How long have you been in Nigeria and what
has been your experience?
I arrived in Nigeria in October 2013. I came in
from Rwanda where I had spent four years.
Before then, I was in Ivory Coast, Liberia and Mali.
Thus, I have relatively large experience of West
Africa and Africa.
-What is EU’s relationship with Nigeria and
what areas do you think Nigeria’s government
needs to improve?
There are two things: first of all, institutions. I
think globally, Nigeria has made a lot of progress
in terms of deepening democracy in this country,
from military rule to civilian rule, from one single
man to a group of people, from one single party
to bi-partisan system, almost bi-partisan system.
So, in the long term, you see a progression with all
kinds of hiccups and difficulties, but the trend is
good and is accompanied by basic freedoms and
liberties. These include: media freedom, freedom
of speech, freedom of religion and freedom of
belief. Those are the core of freedoms and
liberties for citizens. It’s more than a declaration
of human rights, but it’s a declaration that is
translated into reality. I think one can assume
there is freedom of press here and freedom of
belief. But it is not enough. Social and economic
rights are really not guaranteed in this country, de
facto and efficiently. Maybe on paper and in the
constitution, they are, but in reality, they are not.
Here, I want to emphasise also that it is important
also for those who believe that it is more
important to develop the economy or the
business or growth rather than re-distribute
everything to the poor. To really develop in a
sustainable way the economy, you need not only
democracy, but you need also to re-distribute
social benefits to the people and to do that is a
question of leadership and people. It is also a
question of institution. Therefore, strengthening
the institutions, not on paper, but in reality is
absolutely key. We are working a lot in those
sectors related to rule of law, democracy, human
rights, elections, and police and criminal justice.
There are a lot of things to do to really defend
basic rights of the people who were in prisons,
who were involved in any case of criminal
proceedings.
-Why do you think many African nations,
including Nigeria, struggle to conduct
peaceful and credible elections?
I started working in Africa since the late 80’s.
Hence, I have seen progression since 89, 90, 91.
We have seen a lot of relatively credible, peaceful
and transparent elections with good turnover of
leadership and the emergence of new political
parties in addition to the old traditional single
parties. We have seen also the basic
transformation of the African politics from
nationalism to something different. What we miss
today is certainly, political parties that really have
to make choices in the field of economy and
those questions of re-distribution. In other words,
I personally miss the liberal party or socialist
party. The role of the state is always a big issue
between the left and the right, between the
labour and the conservative. You don’t have that
in Africa in most cases, with a few exceptions of
course. Thus, you always have the old traditional
party, the one where the founding father, the
nationalist, created and built since the 60’s, 70’s.
Their successors, the new comers, come without
any real economic or political platform.
-How does voters’ education impart
democracy?
It is absolutely necessary to have elections to
foster democracy, but it’s not sufficient, because
to give the right to vote to a population with so
many illiterate persons or uneducated people is
not at all sufficient. I think one cannot develop
democracy without educating the people, without
reaching a height where a very percentage of the
people would go to school until they are 18. And
that’s not the case in most countries in Africa.
When people are not being well educated, they
cannot understand the issues and challenges at
stake and also because the parties do not offer
different views, I mean there is the ‘party for
freedom and democracy’ and the ‘party for
democracy and freedom’, so what’s the
difference, frankly? The issue of the third
mandate is not as difficult as it can be in other
countries in Africa, where you have presidents
changing the constitution the year before the
expiration of their second mandate. That would
not happen in Nigeria although I am aware of the
debate on the issue of President Goodluck
Jonathan being in power to terminate the
mandate after the death of President Umaru
Yar’Adua, there have been some discussions on
that. The role of the electoral commission is
absolutely key. In many well established
democracies, there is no electoral commission, it
is the Ministry of Home Affairs or Internal Affairs.
It’s just like civil registration, why do you have
voter cards? If you had ID cards, you won’t have
voter cards. In my country, there is no voter card.
You need a better management of the population
and it is linked to other aspects of what I call
managing the population. It is not only managing
births and deaths. It is each step in the life of the
citizens, going to school, leaving the school,
getting married, having children that you have to
manage. It used to be managed in the past in nice
books but today, with IT technology, it should be
much easier. That is, I think, an issue, that right
after the election, the new government should
really address. With good census, we had the
2006 census; nobody knows how many Nigerians
are in Nigeria. Frankly, there is the competition
state by state, ‘I need more citizens in order to get
more percentages of revenue,’ we know that. That
is not good because how can you plan your
development if you don’t know how many citizens
you have in your state.
Political parties also have to take responsibility
for good elections, it is not only INEC, it involves
the political parties. The media, each and every
stakeholder including the citizens are needed to
deliver good elections including the security
forces, the executive, the judiciary.
-What would be your message for the winner of
the presidential election?
The world is watching Nigeria, you have seen
President Barack Obama recording a video tape
to Nigeria. Today (Thursday) the EU President has
written to President Jonathan and Gen.
Muhammadu Buhari (retd). I just got the letter an
hour ago, emphasising a few things. Africa is
important to the US and EU, but Africa and West
Africa are also watching Nigeria. To the politicians
and the political parties, there is no place in
democracy for violence. I just read what the
Deputy Governor of Rivers State, Ikulu, said,
“don’t hesitate to spill blood.” This is not
acceptable. It is absolutely not acceptable to say
things like that. A few weeks ago, we reacted quite
badly to the Governor of Katsina calling the
opposition cockroaches. What is that? You cannot
compare a human being to an animal. You cannot
shed human blood, even that of your worst
enemy or the worst person. If you are a democrat
and you want to develop democracy, you do not
use that kind of terms and you do not use
violence. Unfortunately, we do very much fear
post-electoral violence. And like I said earlier, we
are watching you, everybody is watching Nigeria
because we are expecting a new step forward
towards an enhanced and strengthened
democracy. But we are also watching what people
are saying and what people will be held
accountable. I don’t know how we would hold
people accountable, but there are many ways of
holding people accountable and I think it’s a
general consensus among the Nigerian
population. They want their leaders held
accountable not only on their political
commitments but also those kind of things.
Impunity and violence have no place in
democracy. We are happy we have been invited
to observe the elections, but I want to clarify
here, it is not the EU delegation that is observing
the elections. We have an independent
autonomous mission with a chief observer, he is
totally autonomous, I don’t have to give him
instructions, he doesn’t choose between any of
the candidates. He has no political agenda at all,
but people don’t believe that. There are no
friends in international relations, you only have
interests.
-What sanctions will the EU impose on
politicians who instigate violence during the
elections?
I think it’s too early to say and I don’t want to
mention the word, sanction, because it is already
pre-empting the fact that there would be a good
reason to impose sanction. We don’t call it
sanctions, we call it appropriate measures. We
would see what kind of measures, but it is
something the EU is always looking at in the
global framework. If there are UN sanctions, we
follow with EU sanctions. But we believe much
more in prevention. Thus, imposing sanctions is,
frankly, the last resort. We prefer to act in terms
of prevention and preparations. We want to be
clear that there is indeed a red line that should
not be crossed.
-If the election was rigged, should the loser
accept the result?
First of all, it is not black or white. There will
always be places where people would try to rig. In
every country in the world, you always have
people doing that kind of thing. There is a large
spectrum of possibilities, so it is not yes or no.
What is more important is not to judge whether
the process has been rigged or not. The main
point is, is the final result really reflecting the will
of the population? I don’t believe 100 per cent
polling units will be opened from 8 to 5 to give a
chance to everyone to vote. There would be
problems, we will have a storm, heavy rain
somewhere, it may be impossible to reach a
polling unit, we will have all kinds of incidence,
but what will be the impact on the final result is
more important
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