THE PROVISIONS FOR CONSENSUS CANDIDATE IN SECTION 84 OF THE NIGERIAN ELECTORAL ACT, 2022, A SET BACK FOR DEMOCRACY

Abstract

Nigeria is a fertile ground for the test of all manner of untested political ideas. This is due to the unprecedented elasticity of the tolerance limit of the average Nigerian which elasticity has been bolstered by the wedge of primordial attachment to tribe and religion bedeviling the Nigerian people since the amalgamation of the nation. Successive leadership of the country has made a mockery of our democracy and people at every turn on the road to democratic success. The most shocking abuse of our failed democracy as a country came with the enactment of consensus into the Electoral Act, 2022 amid controversies. Section 84 of the Electoral Act, 2022, provides for consensus as an option in the nomination of candidates for election and congresses of political parties to elect party officers. The author relied on analytical non-doctrinal research method to examine available literature on the problems that has attended the nomination of candidates for elections in Nigeria under the previous Electoral Acts. It was discovered in the course of this work that Nigerians political leaders have penchant for impunity and unbridled tendency to abuse the process of nomination of candidates for elective offices in Nigeria. That tendency was only mitigated by judicial intervention in the process. The provisions for nomination by consensus in section 84 of the Electoral Act, 2022 is considered by many actors in the political process as a poisoned arrow shot on the body politic that will eventually lead to its death.