African leaders and politicians have been advised to refrain from labelling opponents as liars, looters and enemies as such unsubstantiated name-calling could trigger violent reactions.
The admonition came from participants at a one-day conference on “Peaceful Elections and National Development” organized by The Goodluck Jonathan Foundation (GJF) in Abuja.
In a communique issued at end of the conference and made available to the media in Abuja on Saturday, participants, after the deliberations, recommended that politicians in Africa should use politics as a platform for building peace and strengthening cooperation across cultures, religions, ethnicity and political alignment.
Other recommendations they made are that efforts towards strengthening democracy should focus more on the delivery of good governance in the polity and allow for people participation;
“Stakeholders in the 2019 general elections in Nigeria should play by the rules and avoid utterances and actions that may precipitate violence;
“The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and Security Agencies should be professional and non-partisan in the performance of their duties;
“Efforts should be made by national governments, civil society organisations and community leaders in Africa to prevent post-election crises;
“Regional and sub-regional organisations like the African Union and ECOWAS should encourage and promote good governance by establishing a reward system for exemplary leaders in Africa;
“Inclusive and people-centred leadership should be the focus of national governments in order to mainstream peace-building in the course of governance;
“The government of Nigeria should ensure the security of lives and property as enshrined in the nation’s 1999 Constitution before, during and after the 2019 general elections;
“Having underscored the nexus of violent conflicts and underdevelopment, African leaders should strive to resolve conflicts through peaceful means.”
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According to the communique, the participants observed that “peace and development are mutually reinforcing; violent conflict affects the psyche of people and the memory of it lingers for generations.
They also noted that there is an increasing use of politics, particularly, elections as instruments for dividing the population on the basis of primordial sentiments, such as ethnicity, religion and geography;
Other observations they made are that elections in Africa have been accorded far too much attention than the more important issues of good governance;
“Politicians in Africa deploy dehumanising labels and stereotypes in demonising each other despite the deadly backlash that these portend, as witnessed in Rwanda and Ogoni in Rivers state, southern Nigeria.
“Nigeria as a regional leader is so strategic to Africa that its politics and governance should represent a positive example;
“A significant number of the elections on the continent have been marred by varying degrees of violence, resulting in the preventable loss of lives and destruction of property;
“Politicians in Africa should avoid actions that may trigger election-related power struggles similar to those experienced in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Kenya and Cote d’Ivoire to prevent the attendant consequences;
“National governments should focus on people-centred development and avoid alienating citizens to the point of hopelessness, which could create a ‘nothing-to-lose’ recourse to violence.”
The conference had as it objectives sensitizing Nigerians in particular and Africa in general on the need to promote peaceful elections and draw lessons that amplify the importance of ensuring violence-free, credible, and transparent elections; support democratic values, promoting peaceful political transitions and averting electoral crisis in Nigeria’s 2019 general elections.
It was attended by over 550 participants, including former heads of state, members of the diplomatic community, development partners, the ECOWAS Commission, Nigeria Police Force, academia, civil society organisations, media, women and youth leaders.
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