The 2023 presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC), an activist, Omoleye Sowore, has said many Nigerians have lost confidence and trust in the electoral process, attributed the low voter turnout at the Area Council elections in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja, to the signing of the Electoral Act Amendment Bill into law by President Bola Tinubu.
Sowore, during an interview with Vanguard on Saturday at the 001 Polling Unit, LEA Primary School, Kabusa, Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC), .
According to the human rights activist, they envisage low turnout and a lack of interest in the election, hence the warning about the National Assembly’s handling of the Election Amendment Bill.
He said, “What we have discovered is that more and more of our people are no longer voting, and I think it was made adverse by the newly signed electoral law, which doesn’t give transparency to the oxygen it needs because democracy needs one oxygen, that’s trust.
“The moment trust is lost, people stay at home because there is nothing more voluntary than voting you take your money, you take your time, and if you feel like the thing is not going to produce the results you want, you don’t leave your house. And that’s what we were warning them when they were signing their electoral law that is not about activists, it’s about the future of the country.
“If you want people to have faith in democracy, you must give them what they ask for, and that is democracy but I am going around today because this is one of my communities, Kabusa.” Sowore further stated that the FCT elections are not the elections that Nigerians are focusing on, but the 2027 general elections.
