Nigeria is pretending to practise democracy, Donald Duke says
Translated from English and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.
At a glance
Interview
Named sources
Context piece
- Former Cross River State governor and PRP presidential candidate Donald Duke said Nigerians were better off under military rule than after 27 years of civilian government.
- He argued that persistent problems including out-of-school children, weak healthcare, unemployment and inadequate infrastructure showed that democracy had not delivered sufficient benefits.
- Duke also criticized Nigeria's weakened opposition, disputed election results and ineffective checks on executive power.
Donald Duke says Nigeria is only pretending to practise democracy, arguing that 27 years of civilian government have imposed heavy costs without producing corresponding improvements in people's lives.
The former Cross River State governor and Peoples Redemption Party presidential candidate said Nigerians were better off under military rule. "The people were better off under the military. At least governance was not that expensive," Duke said in a weekend interview.
The people were better off under the military. At least governance was not that expensive
He said the record should be judged by citizens' welfare and the democracy dividends delivered since Nigeria returned to civilian rule in 1999. In his assessment, the country still faced the same fundamental problems, and some had worsened. The number of children out of school had deteriorated, healthcare was not improving, and infrastructure remained deficient.
This is my frustration, because there’s no problem we cannot resolve. We’re not a unique country. There are peer reviews you can do. How did you solve this? How did you do that? Are we thinking through our problems?
Duke also pointed to electrification and unemployment, saying he saw no structured approach to resolving them. "This is my frustration, because there’s no problem we cannot resolve. We’re not a unique country. There are peer reviews you can do. How did you solve this? How did you do that? Are we thinking through our problems?" he said.
He blamed part of the crisis on a weakened and self-interested opposition and on elections whose results often failed to reflect voters' wishes. That, he said, had discouraged people from voting and weakened accountability. "Because your vote doesn’t matter, there’s a tendency to take people for a ride and disregard what is required by the people," Duke said.
Because your vote doesn’t matter, there’s a tendency to take people for a ride and disregard what is required by the people
Duke argued that neither the National Assembly nor the judiciary provided effective checks on executive power. "We don’t have a democracy. We are pretending democracy. We’re not a democracy," he said, adding that there was "no check; there’s no balance."
We don’t have a democracy. We are pretending democracy. We’re not a democracy
About this summary
Originally published by Vanguard in English. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.
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