Of Politicians Threatening Voters

Femi Akintunde-Johnson There was a time when Nigerian politicians threatened one another with defeat at the polls. It was part of the theatre: “We will send you home.” “We will retire your party.” “We will bury you politically.” The language could be colourful, sometimes outrageous, but everybody understood the metaphor. Increasingly, however, the metaphor seems to be losing its protective cover. We are beginning to hear words about killing, flogging, cutting fingers, driving opponents away, sacking officials for failing to deliver votes and even breaking up marriages in the name of political loyalty. At some point, the joke stops being funny. The politician may be laughing; the voter would be checking the exits. Consider the sequence of recent incidents. In Osun, Senator Francis Fadahunsi was summoned by the police after a viral video in which he appeared to tell APC supporters to “kill” members of the Accord Party. He later insisted that he meant killing the party with votes and that the video had been edited to distort his meaning. Context and intent certainly matter. But when the word used is “kill”, in a country with a long and unhappy history of political violence, the burden should not be placed entirely on the listener to decode the joke. Then came Kuje, where the area council chairman, Danjuma Samuel Shekwolo, was reported to have told residents, in effect, to support the APC or leave the area. In Borno, Commissioner for Youth and Sports Development Sainna Buba was reported threatening to flog opponents and cut off the fingers of those who opposed the APC. In Ebonyi, Governor Francis Nwifuru reportedly told newly inaugurated local government chairmen that those who failed to deliver their councils to the APC in 2027 would be removed from office. These are not identical statements, and intellectual honesty requires us not to lump them together as if they carry precisely the same meaning or legal consequence. But taken together, they reveal a political atmosphere in which coercive language is becoming remarkably casual. And now Yobe has joined the procession. The state APC chairman, Muhammad Gadaka, reportedly told women that if their husbands prevented them from voting for the APC, they should leave their marriages, offering to pay their bride price and marry them. After the predictable backlash, he apologised and said the comment was merely joking banter. Again, perhaps he intended humour. But there is something revealing about a political culture in which virtually every offensive political utterance can be retrofitted as “just a joke” after Nigerians become angry. Politics is apparently the only profession where the punchline regularly requires a public apology. The larger issue is not whether every offending politician actually intended to inflict physical harm. It is whether political leaders understand the peculiar danger of their microphones. A careless remark from an ordinary citizen may disappear into the evening air. A governor, senator, commissioner, council chairman or party chairman speaks with an amplifier. Supporters hear him. Political thugs may hear him. Young men looking for validation may hear him. Social media preserves and multiplies the words long after the speaker has forgotten them. The politician may mean metaphor; somebody else may hear permission. This is not merely a matter of taste or good manners. Nigeria now has a new Electoral Act, 2026, and it could not be clearer about the principle involved. Section 97 prohibits parties, candidates, aspirants and others from directly or indirectly threatening people with force or violence during political campaigns in order to compel support or discourage opposition. Section 132 separately makes threats, force, violence, injury, damage or harm intended to induce or compel a person to vote or refrain from voting an offence, carrying substantial penalties upon conviction. The law therefore recognises something politicians sometimes pretend not to understand: intimidation is not campaign language merely because it is delivered from a political platform. The Ebonyi episode deserves particular attention for another reason. When an elected local government chairman is told that his survival in office depends upon delivering his council to the governor’s political party, the issue goes beyond campaign rhetoric. It raises fundamental questions about the independence and democratic purpose of local government. The Supreme Court has repeatedly affirmed the constitutional status of democratically elected local government councils and rejected the notion that they are simply extensions of state governors’ political machinery. If a chairman’s primary political test becomes the production of votes for the governor’s party rather than the quality of administration delivered to citizens, then the local government begins to look less like the grassroots tier of government and more like a grassroots campaign office. But let us resist the temptation to make this an APC-only sermon. Political intimidation did not arrive in Nigeria with the APC, and it will not disappear if another party occupies Government House or Aso Rock. Every major political party has its collection of political bruisers, boastful campaigners and professional intimidators. Tomorrow’s opposition may become tomorrow’s government, and yesterday’s victim may suddenly discover the joys of wielding power. The standard must therefore be larger than partisan convenience. If threatening the voter is wrong when APC does it, it is wrong when PDP, Labour Party, NNPP, NDP or any other party does it. Democracy cannot have one morality for the ruling party and another for its opponents. There is also a responsibility on the media, which must resist turning every inflammatory utterance into political entertainment. Reporting such statements is legitimate; becoming their distribution network is another matter. We should provide context, ask whether the words violate electoral law, seek clarification, pursue the official response and, importantly, follow up. The Nigerian political ecosystem has perfected the art of producing outrage on Monday and forgetting it by Wednesday. Summon the politician, issue a statement, apologise, declare the matter closed – and wait for the next microphone. The security agencies must equally resist selective enforcement. A politician should not be investigated merely because his opponent is noisier on social media. Nor should politically connected individuals enjoy the protective umbrella of “political speech” when their words cross into credible threats or intimidation. Where an offence is alleged, investigate it fairly; where evidence exists, prosecute according to law; where there is no case, say so. Justice should neither be a weapon of political persecution nor a luxury reserved for people without political connections. And perhaps the most important responsibility belongs to us, the voters. We must stop confusing menace with strength. A politician who frightens opponents is not necessarily powerful. A politician who threatens dissenters is not necessarily courageous. Sometimes he is merely announcing, rather loudly, that he has run out of arguments or ideas. The real test of political strength is the ability to persuade people who are free to disagree with you. An election is supposed to be a peaceful argument conducted with ballots. I make my case; you make yours. Your candidate promises one thing; mine promises another. We argue, campaign, persuade and eventually vote. Nobody should have to wonder whether voting against the incumbent could cost him a job, a contract, a government benefit, his home, his safety or his fingers. Nobody should be told that political disagreement is grounds for exile from his own community. And no woman should be invited to choose between her marriage and her ballot because a party chairman has temporarily forgotten that a voter is not party property. As 2027 approaches, we should therefore be asking a more uncomfortable question than “Who are you voting for?” We should ask: what kind of political behaviour are we prepared to reward with our votes? Because today the threat may be directed at the opposition. Tomorrow it may be directed at you. And if citizens must first calculate the possible consequences of their political choice before exercising it, then the ballot may still be physically available – but democracy has already begun to lose its meaning. God forbid.