Lawyer and political education advocate Tope Temokun has said that Nigeria’s fight against vote-buying will remain ineffective unless the country confronts the systemic poverty that makes many citizens vulnerable to electoral inducements.
In a follow-up to the launch of his Monday Political Education Series, Temokun described the public response to the inaugural edition as encouraging and intellectually engaging, noting that the primary objective of the initiative is to stimulate informed political discourse and deepen democratic consciousness among Nigerians.
According to him, the discussions generated by the first edition demonstrated that democracy flourishes through informed debate rather than unquestioning acceptance.
He observed that one point of consensus among participants was that votes should never be exchanged for temporary material benefits such as cash, bags of rice, ankara fabrics or other forms of inducement.
Temokun maintained that a vote represents more than a ballot paper, describing it as a declaration of the kind of society citizens wish to build. He argued that exchanging that right for short-term relief amounts to sacrificing one’s political future for immediate gratification.
He, however, noted that opinions diverged on the issue of responsibility for vote-selling.
According to him, while some participants blamed citizens who willingly exchange their votes for material benefits, others argued that greater responsibility rests with politicians who deliberately exploit poverty as an electoral strategy.
Temokun acknowledged the validity of both perspectives but insisted that the deeper injustice lies in the conditions created by the political class.
He argued that impoverished citizens are already victims of a political and economic system that has denied them access to quality education, healthcare, employment opportunities and adequate social welfare.
To place the greater burden of blame on such citizens, he said, amounts to punishing them twice—first by subjecting them to deprivation and then by condemning them for accepting the limited assistance offered by politicians during elections.
Describing the situation as “double jeopardy,” Temokun contended that shifting public attention toward the actions of poor voters allows the political class to evade accountability for creating and sustaining the conditions that encourage electoral inducement.
He warned that such reasoning wrongly portrays governance as a commercial transaction rather than a constitutional responsibility owed to citizens.
According to him, the country’s real challenge extends beyond vote-buying to what he described as “poverty-buying”—the deliberate creation and maintenance of economic hardship that leaves voters vulnerable to manipulation.
Temokun maintained that vote-buying is merely a symptom of a much deeper structural problem rooted in widespread poverty and inequality.
He further argued that political education should not be limited to urging citizens not to sell their votes but should also expose and challenge the political actors responsible for creating the socio-economic conditions that make vote-selling appear to be a rational survival strategy.
He called for deliberate efforts to reshape voting behaviour by encouraging Nigerians to prioritise competence, integrity, credibility and vision over material inducements during elections.
According to him, such a shift would enable credible candidates with genuine ideas for governance to gain public support even without relying on patronage or election-day incentives.
Temokun concluded by reaffirming his commitment to continuing the weekly political education series, expressing confidence that a politically informed citizenry is far more difficult to manipulate than one driven by desperation.
He said the conversation on political education would continue in subsequent editions as part of efforts to promote democratic values, constitutional governance and informed civic participation.