Use June 12 as serious democratic lessons, Adedipe tells Nigerians

By Edith Nwapi

A Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Adeola Adedipe has advised Nigerians to always use the June 12, 1993 electoral incident as a serious lesson to upholding the sanctity of democratic principles.

Adedipe said this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja, while commenting on the 2026 occasion of the June 12 Democracy Day.

He said democracy, the world over is the best system of government, if it is practiced in a way that aligns with postulation of foremost political philosopher, Thomas Paine.

According to him, Paine opined that the right of voting for representatives is the primary right by which other rights are protected. And to take away this right is to reduce a man to slavery.”

Adedipe said that the proposition of this philosopher, finds its most vivid example in the event of June 12, 1993 in Nigeria.

“On June 12, 1993, Nigerians did something that history has not forgotten.

“A people ordinarily divided along the faulty lines of their diversities, went to the polls and in one voice, voted as one nation.

“The presidential election conducted that year was by consensus of domestic and international observers alike, the freest and fairest in Nigeria’s post-independence political history. But, 11 days later, it was annulled,” he recalled.

With that singular act, Adedipe added that the primary right of which Thomas Paine spoke, that protects all other rights was taken away.

The Senior advocate noted that the intense pro-democracy struggle that followed ultimately, compelled a return to democratic governance.

He said, it is that same sovereign will of the people that the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 as amended acknowledges via Section 14(2)(a).

He affirmed that sovereignty belongs to the people of Nigeria from whom government derives all its powers and authority.

“The recognition of June 12 as Democracy Day in 2018 was a welcome and overdue act of national reparation, acknowledging what the historical record had long established: that the mandate was legitimate and that the sacrifice of those who resisted deserved formal honour.

“It must, however, be emphasised that the lesson of June 12 is not confined to the past. It is a standing charge upon the present and upon every generation that will come after must learn from.

” Every election conducted in this country, whether consciously or not, measured against the standard set on June 12,” he said.

The SAN said that every judicial pronouncement on electoral dispute either vindicates or diminishes the principle for which Nigerians stood in 1993.

He added that, the men and women who paid the ultimate price in those streets did so in the firm and solemn conviction that the voice of the people, once clearly and freely expressed, must be final.

“That conviction is the living foundation upon which this republic stands and it must, to this day and in every day that follows, be honoured and upheld,” he said.

NAN recalls that June 12 , 1993 election was presumed to have been won by MKO Abiola of the Social Democratic Party against Bashir Tofa of the National Republican Convention.

NAN further recalls that before the collation of results were formally completed, the process was halted and ultimately annulled by the military administration headed by retired Gen. Ibrahim Babangida.(NAN)(www.nannews.ng)

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Edited by Francis Onyeukwu