Credible Elections in Nigeria: The Role of Information Communication Technology
Obeta, Sebastine C., Ekuma, James N., Elejene, Albert O., Abdulsalam Murtala
2021
The International Journal of Science & Technoledge
Introduction To elect means 'to choose or make a decision', and so sometimes other forms of ballot such as referendums are referred to as elections, especially in the United States. Wikipedia defines election as 'An election is a formal group decision making process by which a population choose an individual to hold public office 'It is a formal process of selecting a person for public office or of accepting or rejecting a political proposition by voting. Elections were used as early in history
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... as ancient Greece and ancient Rome, and throughout the Medieval period to select rulers such as the Holy Roman Emperor , the pope . Most countries hold elections in at least the formal sense, but in many of them the elections are not competitive (e.g., all but one party may be forbidden to contest) or the electoral situation is in other respects highly compromised. Elections are the central institution of democratic representative governments. In a democracy, the authority of the government derives solely from the consent of the governed. The principal mechanism for translating that consent into governmental authority is the holding of free and fair elections. An election is the process of voting to choose someone to be their political leader or representative in government. In a democracy the right to vote is the main way most citizens can influence the decision about how their Country is governed. Citizens get the chance when the Government decides to hold an election. To win an election, the politicians have to persuade the people to vote for them. Each political party need to identify their policies (plan of action) explaining what they will do if they were elected. Each political party presents list of policies that the party promises to carry out if they were elected. But if the process is manipulated the election will not reflect the wish of the people and politicians will no longer be accountable to the people but to their means of getting their position. When few people can manipulate the outcome of an election, then there is danger and it is no longer democracy which is government of the people by the people for the people. People in power will no longer be on their toe to perform. They will not mind if the policies they are implementing is acceptable to the people or not. They will only mind their means of getting to power. It is only credible, free and fair election that will guarantee good governance. To conduct credible, free and fair election is not always easy as politicians are always out to cut corners and gain undue advantage over their opponents. The role of that Information Communication Technology can play to make this feasible is the focus of this paper.
doi:10.24940/theijst/2021/v9/i10/st2110-015
fatcat:hihso3of7jdohfcw6eg5uxn4om