THE CBN'S CASH POLICIES- - MUCH ADO ABOUT VOTES BUYING

CBN'S CASH POLICIES-

MUCH ADO ABOUT VOTE BUYING

By Hon. Emma Asie

The current agony Nigerians are going through as a result of the CBN's  summer-saulting confusing, controversial  and shoddily implemented  policies  on Naira re-design, Cash withdrawal, Cash swap and Cash scarcity, is directly traceable to the electoral evil of vote buying. 

Recall that Mr President Buhari himself in an interview with Premium Times at the early stage of the policy announcement by the CBN Governor Mr Godwin Emefiele said "We will not allow anyone to mobilize funds to disrupt the election" and therefore, the first deadline of the expiration of the N200, N500 and N1000 denominations as legal tenders (January 31st) was non negotiable and sacrosanct. According to him, he wants to leave a legacy of a free , fair and credible election for Nigerians and vote buying has been confirmed to be one of the major menace to this desire. Hence the unalloyed support to the CBN Governor on the Monetary policy. Though the CBN Governor who faced much backlash as being on a revenge mission against some political interests since he lost out at the APC presidential primaries, has denied any political undertone to the policy (despite the timing, speed and hyper obduracy on seeing it through) yet Mr President s interview, openly showed otherwise. So Nigerians were and are subjected to untold hardships, immeasurable anguish, horrifying agony and unquantifiable pains in the primary bid to curb this menace. 

But should the focus be only on vote buying?

Why are we looking at it from only one angle, BUYING VOTES?

Can someone BUY something if the other party is not willing to SELL?

In as much as I fully support any measure that will curb or eliminate monetization of our electoral process, I still insist that the issue should be looked at from at least 2 angles

Politicians are always unscrupulous and always ready to do anything to get votes. 

But with what we witnessed in Ukwulu ,Anambra state in 2021 during the state gubernatorial election, if a voter is unwilling to sell, the vote buyer cannot buy those votes.

We should focus more on prevention of vote buying and selling by sensitizing voters on its dangers and most importantly by openly arresting, prosecuting and  making examples of some vote buyers esp ones caught in the act. Where are the politicians and their agents who were caught or accused of buying votes during the very recent Osun and Ekiti elections?

Untill we start getting serious with this prosecution of vote buyers rather than paying mere lip service to it, we will never get it right in this fight against this evil act. 

What can be done to curb vote buying and selling? 

A)Sensitize and empower people on this 

B)Create a conducive environment for peaceful, free , fair and transparent election 

C) Show seriousness by openly arresting, prosecuting and jailing people already caught in the act (both buying and selling)

And see if vote buying and selling will not reduce drastically

We cannot continue cutting our nose to spite our face. The horror stories of the impacts of this ongoing cash crises are unmentionable. People are suffering unnecessarily while the politicians who are ostensibly the targets of this policy, are completely unaffected and immune from it. 

The Naira re-design policy is anti people and counterproductive. 

Rather the withdrawal limit policy should be more emphasized if the govt truly wants to do something about votes buying.

The N600 billion currently in circulation is too small to cater for the financial needs of Nigerians. Experts say as much as N1.2b to N2bn ought to be in circulation to make for a vibrant economy for a country our size. Not killing innocent Nigerians in the name of fighting vote buying.

Do you even know that with these crises, vote buying is even much more easier?

People do not see the new notes anywhere and are hungry and unable to spend the old notes they have. If on election day , someone offers a voter as low as N1000 of the new notes to sell his or her votes, don't you think the person will willingly do so? Before now, such votes buying used to go for as much as N10,000 or even N20,000 in some areas. Now for a mere N1,000 most people will hungrily sell their votes to get money to feed for the day.  There is no cash anywhere and due to the monitoring laxity and corruption in banks, most of the few notes in circulation are back in the hands of politicians who paid heavily through the backdoor to get them. Meanwhile the poor masses will queue up for hours at banks only to be given N2,000 of the new notes.  Remember the Biblical Esau  sold his birthright for one reason alone - he was hungry. The current scarcity of the approved Naira notes will merely make the offer by politician to buy vote much more attractive to a voter, not minding the amount. 

The aim of the policy might be noble but the implementation is shoddy and very very poor.

  We cannot because of this, encourage lawlessness by encouraging the Federal Government to disobey an order of the Supreme Court,no matter how unpopular that order may be. The law is the law. .

If we support the Federal government on this, then we have no basis crying foul over the continued detention of Nnamdi Kanu whom the courts have ordered should be released immediately and unconditionally. 

Let's face the hard truths

We cannot encourage lawlessness in order to fight an unpopular policy. 

That is encouraging anarchy and no nation can survive it. Jungle justice will now reign if this is allowed to stand

By his nationwide address On Thursday President Buhari has taken the matter out of the hands of the CBN and made the Naira re-design a presidential policy which makes it subject to mediation by the Supreme Court if the components units of the Federation (the states) disagree with it. The Supreme Court has been automatically given jurisdiction. So the challenge of Jurisdiction had taken care of itself. 

What should be focused upon is the substance of the matter and the issue of contempt of court by the Federal government under Buhari. 

Our courts especially the Supreme Court might have been compromised and often deliver controversial and unpopular judgements but unless we want to do away with our constitution, the Supreme Court still remains the highest court of the land whose decisions are final and unquestionable. According to the late Justice Oputa, "The Supreme Court is not final because it is infallible but it is infallible because it is final"  meaning that the supreme court is not without it's errors and failings, but being the Apex court of the Land, its orders, rulings and judgements remain final and not subject to appeal or further review. Hence it is the LAW itself. And so MUST be obeyed in toto, without question. 

That forms why many legal minds are not comfortable with the president's selective obedience to the Supreme Court order by that Thursday broadcast. Some like Femi Falana viewed it as plain contempt of court and disobedience to the rule of law which is the basis for democracy. 

We should fight corruption and vote buying , yes of course.  But let it not come at such humongous cost that negative impact on the people will be too much, thereby leading to the true aim being misunderstood by and lost to the people and hence defeated. Even if it ends up curbing  or even eliminating Votes buying, that will be a pyhrric victory. Justice must be done and must be seen to have to have been done. Perception management is the greatest challenge of policy drafting.

 

The fight against undue monetization of our electoral process should be all encompassing and multi dimensional, and not merely narrowed to the  singular mundane prism of Vote buying. 

Hon Emma Asie MNipr 

Writes from Awka.