Faulty electoral process, insecurity, illegal mining stunt national growth – Catholic bishops

2026-02-23 - 14:47

By Chidi Nkwopara, OWERRI Faulty electoral processes, growing insecurity, illegal mining, and the new tax law have been identified as some measures stunting national growth. President of the Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria, CBCN, Most Rev. Lucius Iwejuru Ugorji, disclosed this at the first plenary meeting at the Bishop’s. On the electoral process, Ugorji said’ “Unfortunately, the process of electing political leaders in Nigeria has been for years undermined by gross irregularities. “These irregularities strongly affect the confidence of Nigerians in the electoral process and have led to the steady decline of voters’ turnout during general elections.” After giving the declining percentages of voter apathy over the years, Archbishop Ugorji said, “This decline says a lot about citizens’ trust in the electoral process and calls into question the legitimacy of elected officials.” “in a democratic dispensation with the mandate of an ever-decreasing minority of citizens of voting age. If this downward trend in voter turnout during general elections continues, it will inflict a disastrous blow to democracy in Nigeria. “To save democracy in the country, the National Assembly should review its recent stand on the Electoral Reform and try to revive the confidence of Nigerians by ensuring that the Electoral Act provides for the mandatory transmission of the election results in real-time from the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) at the polling unit to the INEC Result Viewing (IReV) portal at the Commission’s headquarters to prevent any human tampering with the expressed will of the electorate henceforth. “This is the will of the people and has to be respected. This will promote free, fair and credible general elections in our nation. In passing a bill that is a watered-down version of the people’s will and which creates room for the manipulation of electoral results, the NASS should recall that it had earlier passed the 2025 Tax Bill that demands digital filing, record-keeping and payments across the country. “The honourable members of the NASS should not allow themselves to be perceived as talking out of both sides of the mouth, expressing inconsistent and contradictory positions in the process of passing bills. The world is watching! Above all, God is also watching.” Addressing the rising degree of insecurity in Nigeria, Ugorji said, “We continue to hear sad tales of senseless massacres, mass burials, endless tears and grief. Tensions have heightened in the country due to the new wave of mass kidnapping incidents by gunmen in Kwara, Kebbi, Niger, Kaduna, and Kogi States, involving many students, pupils and worshippers. “The nation is also outraged by recent mass murders in different communities, particularly in Woro and Nuku villages in Kwara State, where over 200 Muslims were gruesomely massacred by scores of Islamist jihadists for refusing to embrace an extremist version of Islam. “As reported, the killing spree lasted all night without any resistance from security agents. The jihadists torched houses, abducted some persons and left the villages in ruin. Many of the dead were later found with hands and feet tied; some were burnt alive, and some others had had their throats slit. Nigeria continues to bleed endlessly. “In all, the gunmen operate boldly, freely and unchallenged. Sometimes, they travel long distances on motorcycles with deadly weapons to attack defenceless communities. “They exploit the longstanding intelligence, operational and capacity deficiencies of our national security architecture to wreak havoc on defenceless communities. “With threats of killing their captives, they demand huge ransoms and even brazenly brandish on social media the ransom they have collected without disguising themselves. Yet, they are not arrested through their digital footprints.” He reasoned that to effectively tackle insecurity, the government must go beyond declaring a national emergency on security and reactive interventions to invest more in modern technological equipment for surveillance and strengthen