A former Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Prof. Attahiru Jega, says Nigeria is on the precipice of collapse.
Jega said this on Wednesday in Abuja at the 2022 Workers’ Political Conference organised by the Nigeria Labour Congress.
He described the 2023 general elections as critical for Nigeria’s unity and an epochal moment which could pull Nigeria from the precipice.
“While Nigeria may not have totally collapsed, it is in the process of collapsing, as reckless elites in control of the governance process are blindly running the country aground. And the 2023 general elections may be the ‘make or break’ epochal moment.
“Given this, all hands of progressive forces must be on deck to prevent our country from imminent collapse, and to turn it around on to a trajectory of good democratic governance for beneficial democratic, socioeconomic development, and human security for Nigerian citizens,” he stated.
Jega, who supervised the 2011 and 2015 general elections, said the state of the socio-economic conditions under which the Nigerian working class operates is saddening.
He maintained that Nigerians have continued to be victims of the reckless misrule of a tiny, rabid and reckless band of elites.
“The manner by which these myopic ‘elected’ so-called ‘leaders’ and their collaborators, have devastated the Nigerian economy, heightened insecurity, and virtually destroyed the basis for national cohesion and integration, Nigeria, as a potentially great nation, is crying for a rescue mission before it is too late,” Jega said.
The former INEC boss added that a broad alliance of progressive forces for national rescue and emancipation was required to get Nigeria out of the current unwholesome predicament in which it finds itself.
“Such a rescue mission cannot be serious, positive and successful, without the active engagement and involvement of the Nigerian workers through their genuine representatives in working-class organisations and movements, in alliance with other progressive and patriotic Nigerians,” said Jega.
