Some time ago, I once thought about the government enforcing a law where everyone would be made to vote, as in, making voting during a general election very compulsory for every citizen and failure to do so would attract a penalty. This thought was birthed in a general election year in Nigeria when a lot of people in my area and contacts on my WhatsApp list refused to vote because they believed that their votes wouldn't count, as usual, because it's a norm in Nigeria. I was so angry because even though I knew that elections were rigged in my country, it would be practically impossible to rig an election that 90% of Nigerians came out to vote in just to vote out the terror that was currently the president.
But I've retracted my thoughts and ideas. It would be absolutely against people's will to enforce voting for everyone. Voting is a right for citizens, and citizens can decide whether to exercise that right or not, and not using it doesn't mean that an offence has been committed against the law.
Honestly, I have people around me who have made up their minds that they're not going to vote in the general election in Nigeria coming up next year, 2027, and I'm not questioning them, even though I'm strongly canvassing that everyone should make it a must to vote out the terror we currently have as president.
As funny and ugly as it sounds, I'm still skeptical about voting in this coming election, not because I believe that my vote won't count, but because the process of voting, as it stands, is strenuous for me. What do I mean? Currently, my voter's card carries the address of my hometown, which I left a long time ago, and the process of changing the address is very long. I just don't see myself locking up my office every now and then, going to sit in some office queue waiting for my voter's card to be changed. That's one of the things that gets me discouraged about the election system in Nigeria. Everything is stressful and chops up a lot of time.
With this kind of situation, forcing everyone to go through the process would also mean that a lot of people are going to be forced to miss work or close down their businesses, which, in the end, would mean there's not going to be any benefit, even if a "good" candidate is voted into power, because there's surely every tendency that the once-good candidate, when voted into power, will become corrupt as well, like others.
Enforcing everyone to go out and vote will only be beneficial to citizens in countries where things are already working, and even though things are not working at that moment, the future is bright for them, and not in a country like mine, where it would take a wiping out of everyone in the country and starting afresh before things would sit well.
Thanks for reading.
Photo: Chatgpt
