By Isaac ASABOR
According to an African proverb, “If the keg of palm wine is not quickly snatched from the hands of an exuberant drunk, he may drink himself to stupor.” A similar proverb has it that “If an overzealous child is not assisted by his elders when roasting yams in the farm, he may innocently set the farm and the hut ablaze”.
There is no denying the fact that the need to bring the foregoing African proverbs into expression in the face of the ongoing electioneering that was kicked off by the leadership of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on September 28, 2022, ahead of the 2023 general and presidential elections is apt.
In fact, prior to the kick-off of the electioneering by the electoral umpire, INEC, virtually all the 18 presidential candidates were engaged in carrying out campaigns of calumny and making verifiable and unverifiable allegations against each other. Some of the campaigns flew either on the back of a given candidate’s ill health, allegations of forgery, financial corruption, and involvement in couriering hard drugs or consumption of such drugs in the past. The presidential campaign, now in its eighth week, has reached a level of passion and acrimony almost unheard-of in Nigeria.
Thus, ostensibly buttressing the fact that the electioneering situation has gotten to a breaking point, the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, being one of the most lampooned candidates, has recently confessed that he stopped using social media because he almost had high blood pressure with the verbal attacks against him. He explained he has been subjected to malicious abuse and had to cease engaging with Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram which are the most used social media in the country.
In as much as the presidential aspirant of the APC does not deserve to be lampooned as been done to him by his traducers, it is germane to say that other aspirants, such as Mr. Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP) and Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) together with their running mates are equally been calumniated by social media trolls.
However, in reaction to the undemocratic development, not a few watchers of the ongoing political campaigns were of the view that the prevailing raucous tone that has characterized the ongoing electioneering is due largely to unexpectedly fierce rhetorical attacks by their supporters and media spokespersons, which has infuriated their rivals, and drawn some blistering ripostes.
Be that as it may, political campaign spokespersons who are arguably motivated by “stomach infrastructure” cannot be exonerated from this case as they are not in any way conducting themselves in a gentlemanly manner. In a report recently chronicled by TheCable, and titled “Ahead of the 2023 elections, it’s a jungle out there!” it was gathered thus: “From personal attacks to tit-for-tat jabs to unverifiable claims and disinformation, campaign spokespersons have been increasingly vociferous in their bids to champion the cause of their principals. Festus Keyamo, Daniel Bwala, Dele Momodu, and Femi Fani-Kayode are some of the presidential spokespersons leading this charge.
“While it was always expected that there would be “fireworks”, many did not anticipate that the campaign season would be this heated.
“Critics have argued that since the return to democratic rule in 1999, the country’s nascent democracy should have grown beyond insignificant tirades by politicians and their spokespersons.
“A paper published in the University of Oxford, titled ‘Troops, Trolls, and Troublemakers: A Global Inventory of Organized Social Media Manipulation, revealed that political parties or candidates use social media to manipulate public opinion during a campaign, either by purposefully spreading fake news or disinformation or by trolling or targeting any support for the opposition party.
“Citing harassment as part of individual targeting – a strategy used by trolls — the paper said it involves the use of verbal abuse, hate speech, discrimination, and trolling against the values, beliefs, or identity of a user or a group of users online.”
Surprisingly, amidst the monkeyshines that have characterized the ongoing campaign ahead of the 2023 presidential election, in particular, INEC seems to be in a slumber as it is yet to make any statement that has the capacity of calling campaigners of calumny to order except the one it issued barely 48 hours to the official commencement of campaigns by political parties for the 2023 General Election, where it reiteratively called that there was the need for issue-based engagements, as well as peaceful conduct of party campaigns.
As conveyed by the statement, the Commission urged all political parties to critically study and pay attention to the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act, the Police Act, and the Public Order Act for the proper and peaceful conduct of political campaigns, rallies, and processions.
Chairman of the Commission, Professor Mahmood Yakubu, made the call, at the opening of a Two-Day Capacity Building Workshop for INEC Press Corps on INEC’s Processes, Innovations, Preparations for the 2023 General Election, and Critical Issues in the Electoral Act 2022, organized with support from the European Union through DAI, in Lagos.”
Represented by the Chairman of the Information and Voter Education Committee (IVEC), Festus Okoye, the INEC Chairman outlined some of the dos and don’ts of political campaigns as prescribed by law.
He said, “The Constitution and Electoral Act 2022 are clear and equivocal on what political parties and candidates must do and must not do during periods designated for campaigns and rallies”.
“A political campaign or slogan shall not be tainted with abusive language directly or indirectly likely to injure religious, ethnic, tribal or sectional feelings.
“Abusive, intemperate, slanderous or base language or innuendoes designed or likely to provoke violent reaction or emotions shall not be employed or used in political campaigns”, he added.
Despite the foregoing statement which unarguably reflects what the commission stood for, ahead of the 2023 election, it is sad to note that political supporters and media spokesmen that are considered to be well-informed and educated; even in the field of law, are the ones been seen to be the violators of the rules.
Against the foregoing backdrop, it is expedient to urge the leadership of the INEC to call campaigners of calumny to order, and even organize a special orientation course for them, primarily to imbibe them with the right behavior needed to be a spokesperson for political aspirants, and to a large extent embark on an elaborate campaign against campaign of calumny with Netizens as the major target audience.
