By Chief Chuckie Nneji
INTRODUCTION: A POLICY BUILT WITHOUT EMPATHY — AND DOOMED TO FAIL
Nigeria’s attempt to eliminate vote buying by punishing the poor has proven not only ineffective but fundamentally misguided. The conversation is always loud around the polling units — chasing the man who collects ₦2,000 or ₦5,000 — yet completely silent around the political billionaires who corrupted the system long before election day.
Worse still, most of the policymakers driving these laws have no lived experience with poverty. They design policies without empathy or compassion, and the result is predictable: failure and deeper inequality.
Vote Selling Is a Symptom — Not the Cause
Vote buying does not begin on election day. It begins deep inside the political structure:
Party tickets purchased with billions
Delegates bribed during primaries
Decampees “settled” and compensated
Campaigns financed with stolen public funds
Political godfathers funded to secure endorsements
By the time the poor voter arrives at the polling unit, the political system is already soaked in corruption. Yet the law focuses on the man who takes ₦2,000 to buy food for his family.
This is not justice; it is hypocrisy.
The Poor People’s Circle Is Not the Criminal
To a hungry citizen, a small cash token is not bribery — it is survival. Criminalizing him will never purify the system. It only exposes how disconnected our leaders are from the realities of the masses.
A country that fails to provide:
employment,
welfare,
security,
healthcare,
or even stable food prices
…cannot suddenly expect the poor to behave like citizens of countries with functioning systems.
Punishing the poor for the failures of the elite is the most insensitive form of governance.
THE REAL CRISIS: VOTER APATHY AND COLLAPSING TURNOUT
Whether we like it or not, Nigerians are abandoning the voting process. Many feel neglected, unsupported, and betrayed by the political class. As long as poverty and hopelessness remain, turnout will continue to decline.
Look at the recent Anambra election:
Registered voters: Over 2 million
Actual votes cast: Less than 600,000
This collapse is not caused by vote buying.
It is caused by poverty, discouragement, insecurity, and lack of motivation.
If we do not address these issues, no law will improve participation.
Government-Backed Incentives Will Bring Voters Back
Around the world, countries use incentives to encourage participation:
civic stipends
tax credits
transportation reimbursement
small allowances
workplace voting leave
These are not considered vote buying; they are recognized as democratic incentives.
Nigeria can adopt the same approach.
A simple, transparent incentive program can:
✅ Boost turnout
✅ Reduce apathy
✅ Dilute the influence of corrupt vote buyers
✅ Empower the poor
✅ Restore trust in the democratic process
When people feel valued, they will return to the polling booths.
EVEN WITH ELECTRONIC VOTING, VOTE BUYING WILL CONTINUE
Some believe that technology will solve vote buying — but that is an illusion.
Even with full electronic voting, vote buying will flourish as long as poverty remains part of our prosperity.
Technology cannot override hunger.
Biometric machines cannot override desperation.
No electronic device can override a system where the poor feel abandoned.
Until poverty is addressed, vote buying will remain a survival mechanism for millions.
THE MISUNDERSTOOD “SOLUDO MODEL”
Governor Chukwuma Soludo introduced a sensible, honest, and transparent idea:
Mobilize the people to come out and vote, and compensate them for the effort.
His intention was simple:
motivate voters
reduce apathy
increase turnout
revive civic participation
He even announced it publicly, which proves he was not attempting to secretly buy votes.
Vote buyers operate in the dark, not in the open.
Soludo wanted to trigger a chain reaction:
His party mobilizes
Opposition parties mobilize
The masses turn out in large numbers
Democracy becomes competitive again
But instead of embracing the strategy, opposition candidates twisted it into “vote buying”.
THE MEDIA’S DOUBLE STANDARDS
Shockingly, the same journalists who attacked Soludo for proposing voter mobilization with compensation are now blaming politicians for “not doing enough to bring voters out”.
This contradiction highlights a deeper intellectual confusion.
You cannot condemn a leader for proposing a solution
and later condemn him again for not implementing the solution
you previously attacked.
It is the hypocrisy of a system that refuses to face the truth.
THE TRUTH
Vote buying will never stop through punishment.
It will never stop through EFCC operations.
It will never stop through camera surveillance.
It will never stop through electronic voting.
Vote buying will end only when poverty ends.
As long as the poor are abandoned, as long as hunger remains widespread, as long as the political class lacks empathy, vote selling will remain a survival tool.
CONCLUSION: A NEW PATH
Nigeria must stop:
❌ criminalizing poverty
❌ punishing the poor for elite failures
❌ pretending that technology can fix hunger
❌ chasing symptoms instead of the disease
Instead, Nigeria must begin to:
✅ confront elite corruption
✅ address the economic roots of vote selling
✅ motivate voters with lawful incentives
✅ rebuild trust in the democratic process
✅ embrace policies shaped by empathy and compassion
Only then will voter turnout rise.
Only then will corruption shrink.
Only then will our democracy begin to stabilize.
Until empathy returns to governance,
criminalizing vote buying will continue to produce zero results.
*Chief Chuckie Nneji, is
Odibo Oha II na NkanuLand
