The National Leader, National Democratic Coalition Renewal Group Worldwide, Atilade Adeeyo has come out to say that Nigeria’s democracy should be protected from being scuttled under any guise.

He recently had his say while speaking to the press, and Nigerians have been reacting.

According to him, democracy has really improved in Nigeria because he now sees Nigerians voting without being paid, which was never the case in recent years.

He added that Buhari really meant it when he said he would leave a legacy of free and fair elections before leaving power.

His words, “A statesman is someone who plans for the future generation, he thinks ahead. We had statesmen in our First Republic, politicians like the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe, Tafawa Balewa, Aminu Kano etc. But do we have people like them again? Now, some people are calling for an emergency rule, and some are calling for a military takeover. I think such people are selfish and very myopic. We are ready to engage them. In one of our press releases, we expressed readiness to engage them. Awolowo once said that the worst democracy is better than the most benevolent dictatorship. We have seen it all over the world.”

“The President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari(retd.) said he would leave a legacy of free and fair elections. This year’s election was the first I saw that people did not collect money, they were not bought and they still voted their conscience. But the agitators of cancellation of the election are basing it on the fact that the election was not posted immediately as promised by INEC. The commission told us that the server was attacked several times within 24 hours. Had it been that the results have been uploaded immediately, the INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmoud Yakubu, would have been put in disarray because you would have been seeing different results on the server and that would have thrown the country into chaos. I think we should salute his courage that he anticipated that. The election was free and fair to the best of my knowledge because I was involved.”

“Democracy has improved. I started participating actively in voting in 1993. I was 23 years old then. I trekked from the University College Hospital, Ibadan to Eleyele in Ibadan to cast my vote then. Even until last year, people were not voting without being paid. But in the 2023 general elections, people came out without being paid to vote. Again, the issue of hooliganism was reduced significantly by my experience. We have really improved compared to what it used to be.”