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| Card Reader and Credibility of the 2015 General Elections in Taraba State of Nigeria |
Tsokwa Solomon, Prof. Makodi Biereenu-Nnabugwu
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Abstract:
Contemporary, democracy has been adjudged as the best and widely accepted form of governance as it empowers or confers on the people popular sovereignty. Elections represents one of the pillars of democracy as it affords the people the opportunity to change or oust leader(s) whose interests and actions does not represent that of the society. Elections provide political education for citizens and ensure the responsiveness of democratic governments to the will of the people. In Nigeria, elections are often marred by irregularities such as rigging, manipulation of results, voter intimidation, thuggery etc. The Independent Electoral Commission tasked with the conduct of elections in Nigeria has repeatedly tried to come up with some policy measures aimed at improving the quality of elections. One of such is the introduction of card readers for voters' accreditation and voting. This paper thus focuses on card reader and credibility of the 2015 General elections in Taraba State in Nigeria. The paper adopted Social Contract Theory as its theoretical underpinning. The paper observes that despite the skirmishes that accompanied the introduction of card reader in the voting process in Taraba state Nigeria, the cases of election malpractice resulting from poor or unfair voters' registration and voters' record keeping were significantly reduced and thereby giving credibility to the election. Against this backdrop, the paper recommends inter-alia that political parties and Nigerians at large should support reforms and initiatives such as electronic voting, e-government that are capable of making the entire electoral process credible.
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