Former President Goodluck
Jonathan says improving the standard of elections in Africa will encourage
people use their votes to remove bad leaders.
Speaking to the SABC News at the
Independent Electoral Commission’s Results Operation Centre in Pretoria, Jonathan
said the electoral umpire plays an important role in ensuring safe and
successful elections.
The former president, who is
leading an observer mission of the Electoral Institute for Sustainable
Democracy in Africa (EISA) to monitor the South Africa’s general election
scheduled for May 8, said his team is confident in the electoral process
according to what they have observed.
“This year’s election appears to
be one of the strongly contested elections so far in the history of SA
democracy and everybody is interested in the outcome. We have observed some of
the rallies and we are quite comfortable how things are going,” Jonathan said.
“The key thing about elections is
the body managing the election and of course the security, the police. If the
stakeholders, the political parties have confidence in these two organisations,
then of course we are quite hopeful.
“I have gone to many African
nations as leader of different observation missions including the Commonwealth,
African Union, National Democratic Institute, and of course EISA and I am quite
impressed and hopeful that the standard of managing of our elections will
continue to improve.
“I believe that if we improve our
standard of elections, we will get to that point where people, using their
vote, can remove a leader they feel is not leading them well.”
Jonathan said governance has
nothing to do with age, adding that young people have a role to play in driving
new trends in information technology and knowledge-based economy.
“Good leadership does not depend
on age alone. It has to do with the individual. The key thing is being able to
lead your country well,” he said.
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