PRESS RELEASE FROM SME FOR MAY 29th, Democracy 2019.

 Nigeria's Democracy Day June 12 is a public holiday to commemorate the restoration of democracy in the Federal Republic of Nigeria. May 29 was initially the official democracy day in Nigeria, marking when the newly elected Olusegun Obasanjo took office as the President of Nigeria in 1999, ending multiple decades of military rule that began in 1966 and had been interrupted only by a brief period of democracy from 1979 to 1983.

Democracy contrasts with forms of government where power is either held by an individual, as in an absolute monarchy, or where power is held by a small number of individuals, as in an oligarchy.

Democracy is the capacity of all voters to participate freely and fully in the life of their society.With its emphasis on notions of social contract and the collective will of all the voters, democracy can also be characterised as a form of political collectivism because it is defined as a form of government in which all eligible citizens have an equal say in lawmaking

According to the words of a Nigerian writer and Noble Laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka “Let us say there are prospects for a new Nigeria but I don’t think we have a new Nigeria yet”. How be it, Nigeria has enjoyed little benefits and advantages of being democratic nation.

Some advantages democracy has brought upon us ranges from International recognition, power sharing, right to vote and be voted for, active citizenry/ participation of the masses in governmenance and fundamental human rights. While. Some disadvantages this has also brought uopn us ranges from corruption, poor dividend of democracy and electoral Violence and malpractices.

The late music maestro and activist, Fela, criticized democracy in his 1986 album, Teacher, Don’t Teach Me Nonsense, when he sang, that democracy is a crazy and under-achieving experience in Nigeria. Fela, in his true way of simplifying and satirizing a complex phenomenon, inverted the two syllables in the word “democracy” and concluded  with “crazy demonstration” to typify the absurdity challenging the Nigerian society at that time. Again, he put the two syllables of “democracy” together again and came up with “demonstration of craze!” Democracy, as a framework with which we try as much as possible to organize our society, Fela claimed, is ruining things for us rather than repairing them. What we were experiencing in our body polity, Fela’s album concluded, is not democracy. Democratic governance, he implies, has to have a deeper and more prudent meaning than the mindlessness that was reigning in the society. A system of government as Fela puts it, “rich man dey mess, poor man dey cry” cannot be said to be democratic governance because it weighs down on the very people it promises to protect and serve. A government where the rich and the politically powerful trample on the rights of the poor is not a system that should claim it practices democratic governance.

To rewrite history and change the norm so far, we must be a core-catalyst people, ready, willing and able to ignite the fire of change, foster the awareness of our people and pay the price for their total liberation from the stranglehold of power prodigals who possess power for self and not for service talk less of the overall welfare of their people and development of their nation at large.

Comrade David Shipeolu

Convener; Social Media Evangelism (SME)