2023:CSO plans influencing electoral outcomes through civic engagementÂ
The Campaign for Transformative Governance, a civic engagement initiative, Wednesday said that it would lead citizen to hold deliberations with electoral candidates on their proposed policies and programmes, while ensuring issue-based debates and educating electorate to enable them make informed choices on whom to vote in the 2023 elections.
Jaiye Gaskia, co-coverner of the campaign, said this at a press conference, held in Lagos.
The campaign, he said, is being backed by the Solidarity Center, UK, and it also involve the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Trade Union Congress (TUC); Amalgamated Union of Public Corporation, Civil Service Technical and Recreational Services Employees (AUPCTRE), and the Federation of Informal Workers Organisation of Nigeria (FIWON).
Gaskia said their focus is on three broad areas, namely access and effective public service delivery; human security, and political education. He added that the group’s chapters across states have been mandated “to develop working peoples charter of engagement that will reflect the priorities in each state.”
“Our desire is to see that the 2023 elections are fought on the basis of issues that directly impacts the life of ordinary citizens,” he said.
Explaning, Gaskia said they would “engage with the electoral process and the political situation, influence the content of the election campaign, debates, and policies of political parties and the candidates”. This, he said, is “preparatory to influencing the outcome of the elections and the nature of governance that emerges after the elections.”
Comrade Henry Urombo, who spoke for AUPCTRE, said their organisation decided to join the coalition to see that “working people in the informal sector, who are “marginalized and unheard of are also able to put their issues forward in the political sector”. He lamented rising cost of business and lack of social security for informal sector workers.
“In the informal sector, we bear the brunts of poor electricity supply; the cost of energy supply and alternative power sources are increasing, and there is no programme to provide organized work places for people to work and also to ensure economies of scale. What we have are evictions from places of work and market demolition, ” he said.
TUC’s assistant secretary-general Ebaho Anthony said that labour would educate its members about ‘voting personalities and not political parties’.
On her part,Comrade Toyin Sokunbi, the Lagos chairman AUPCTRE lamented the food inflation, reduced disposable incomes and rising cost of living affecting working people in the country.
