By Ishola Adeleke, YeyeNews.com, October 5, 2021
In a poll conducted by YeyeNews.com, majority of Nigerians would prefer to get paid than go out to vote for anyone seeking their votes. 75% of Nigerians say they would swap their rights to vote a candidate of their choice in an election for N3,000; 83% said they would do so for only N5,000.
Also, for a bag of salt, 33% told YeyeNews.com they would surrender their voter’s card for a forthcoming election while 62% would to do that for a 5kg bag of rice. “The results of this poll reveal a lot about how disenchanted Nigerians have become with the electoral process in particular and democracy in general”, one pollster told YeyeNews.com.
A commercial bus driver in Lagos told our reporter that he was not surprised about the poll results: “In Lagos we do come out to vote but the our votes don’t count, so getting the money would be something. Whether we vote or not, it’s like when we go out to vote we have given them the right to select who is best to represent us and that’s how it is everywhere.”
“We are satisfied with this situation because it is the best arrangement for a country like Nigeria. The electorates are not enlightened enough to make informed choices so its in their advantage to vote for the candidate that provides the highest inducement”, a prominent chieftain of one of the major political parties told YeyeNews.com by WhatsApp chat.
Meanwhile, an official of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, told YeyeNews.com that the commission knows that vote-buying in different forms is prevalent and that INEC have tried its best to curtail it but to no avail. “It seems Nigerians feel better off with the immediate gratification. So everyone has accepted the situation as it is. We are just going to continue announcing the results as they are given to us because we respect the desire of all the actors. That is why we are independent”, the official explained.
