Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and Post Election Peace Building in Nigeria: A Comparative Study of 2011 and 2015 Presidential Elections

Abstract

The credibility of any election is partly depending on the institution saddle with the responsibility of organizing and conducting election from the beginning to the end, which further determines or builds post-electoral environment of democratic societies to either be peaceful or otherwise. In Nigeria, efforts in building peaceful post-election environment have always been a major challenge from the First Republic, through the Second and aborted the Third Republic down to the Fourth Republic. In this regard, this paper aims to examine INEC's effort in post-election peace building in Nigeria, using comparative study of INEC's pre-election arrangement, election and post-election issues of 2011 and 2015 Presidential Elections, through a content method of data analysis. The analysis revealed that INEC had played a key role in building peace during and after 2011, and especially in 2015 presidential elections, through the introduction of biometric innovations in the electoral processes such as; biometric voters register, permanent voter's cards, biometric card readers as well as access to information by electorates on INEC website among others, thereby conducting a free, fair and credible election that is acceptable to the electorates. The paper concluded that INEC alone can serve as a peace building mechanism by providing a transparent electoral process, and therefore, recommended that INEC should continue to improve and strengthen the use of biometric measures in its forthcoming or subsequent election in the country.