Leadership Challenges in Democratization: An Analysis of Independent National Electoral Commission of Nigeria

Abstract


I. Introduction
Leadership serves as the most important and crucial source of competitive advantage.Leaders in organization are tasked with the responsibility of deciding what happens in the organization by giving vision, direction and momentum that bring about success of the organization.Consequently, leaders are the catalyst that create and manage the environment, organizational culture and strategies that brings about innovation, efficiency and success in the organization (Ngambi, 2010).According to Andriani, Kesumawati, and Kristiawan (2018) shows that a leader"s duty is to provide direction, influence and motivation to others to perform certain tasks so as to inspire his subordinates to work more efficiently in order to realize the realization of the goals and objectives of the organization.
Eventually, the management of election is a colossal logistical task which involves management of people, technology and resources.There was significant increase in the number of elections that were held from 1948 to 2006, amounting to over 2,600 national contest around the world (T.James et al. 2016).There is a great deal of attention in the administration of elections and at the same time there is a movement towards the establishment of an independent Election Management Body (EMB) which is charged with the responsibility of administering elections and managing all electoral processes from the nomination of candidates, organization of polling stations, registration of political parties, voter registration, counting and announcement of results.
Moreover EMBs around the world appears in many different organizational shapes.Conversely, there has been significant variation in the quality of elections.Although many well-known elections, often use technology, resources and personnel innovatively and also efficiently, there are often concerns about administrative problem, technological failures, incomplete electoral registers and wide spread of fraud.This variation is found in both established and transitional democracies (Van Ham and Lindberg, 2015).
Nigeria is the same as many modern African countries is a democratic state, with a presidential system of government, 36 federation states known as the "state" and Abuja as the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).From independence in 1960, Nigeria has experience both military and civilian rule; the military rule starting from 1966 and the return of civilian rule in 1979 has known as the second republic, third republic in 1993 and the forth republic in 1999.Hence, as a democratic state, elections are held every four years at both federal, each of the 36 states and at the Federal Capital Territory by an electoral management body known as the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) from 1999 to date (forth republic).The concept of good and effective leadership is one that not only has soft-power skills and hard-power skills, but also has the ability to know "when" and "how" to use skills (contextual intelligence) within the organization (Blinkhorn, Taylor, and Blinkhorn, 2015).Jeremy (2011) defines leadership as the process in which people are being engaged towards the realizing of their absolute potentiality in obtaining a value-added, collective vision, with determination and integrity.The influence of the leader should be in such of a manner that members cooperate voluntarily with each other for the realization of goals and objectives determined for each member, as well as for the group.The connection that exists between the leader and employee, as well as the quality of employees" performance are of large extent influenced by the leadership style adopted by the leader (Ojokuku, Odetayo, and Sajuyigbe, 2012).
part of the leaders, absent of conducive atmosphere for leaders to innovate and lack of skills to generate innovation in public sector (Santos and Kapoor, 2015).As a result, the development of an innovation ecosystem by leaders has become a challenge, therefore, making the generation of new public values almost impossible (Meynhardt 2014).
Poor quality management leads to effective disenfranchisement of individual or a whole geographical region if their ballots are not processed effectively and efficiently.Poor management can leads to delay in the publications of results that can lead to political and economic instability.In uttermost case it can also lead to wrong candidate winning and therefore affects the confidence in electoral process.According to Moveh (2015), as an electoral umpire, the INEC has been confronted with number numerous crisis and challenges in almost all its electoral management since its establishment.The INEC is confronted with credibility problems, because most citizens lost confidence in its capacity to organize free, credible and transparent elections.All elections conducted by INEC from 1999-2019 have been criticized on the basis of being riddled with various problems, resulting in questionable outcomes.INEC lacks financial, institutional and administrative independenc also evidenced by its funding and composition by the presidency, as well as its lack of professional staff and security of tenure for its officials (Edet 2016).
According to Agbu (2016), it is evident that the viability of a credible elections in Nigeria"s practice of democracy have become almost impossible as elections are usually confronted with a lot of irregularities in all ramification leading to the questions on their credibility (Mgba 2017).Additionally, INEC is identified with absence of administrative efficiency, political neutrality and public accountability (Odoziobodo, 2015).Therefore, the need to identify the challenges and solutions needed in INEC that will ensure an efficient and effective atmosphere that will confront the various administrative problems facing the commission.
The study focuses on the leadership challenges faced by INEC of Nigeria from 1999 to 2019.Therefore, the following objectives were set; to identify the nature of challenges faced by INEC leaders from 1999 to 2019; and to explore the role of INEC leaders in sustaining service delivery in the commission.
In order to investigate the leadership challenges in EMBs like INEC in Nigeria, a qualitative research method was employed through the conduct of an in-depth interview of selected principal officers in INEC holding strategic leadership positions in the commission.To capture the research objectives which are to identify the nature of challenges faced by INEC leaders from 1999 to 2019; to explore the role of INEC leaders in sustaining service delivery in the commission; and to proffer possible solutions to the challenges of leadership in INEC, The qualitative method used provides insight into the various challenges faced by leaders in the commission.
The questions of the in-depth interview was developed by examining the literature concerning leadership challenges in public organizations.Nine (9) principal officers holding strategic positions in the commission were interviewed between 12th and 27th of May, 2021.Each of the interview session lasted 40 minutes average.Each of the principal officers have at least 20 years experience in electoral management.Before each interview, the researchers explain the aim of the research in detail and ask for permission in order to record the interview.Both audio recordings and notes taken during the interview are used in the analyses.The questions of the interview are as follows: First, what are the challenges you faced in the discharge of your responsibilities?Second, how do you contribute in sustaining service delivery in the commission?And Third, what are the possible solutions to the leadership challenges in the commission?

II. Public Sector Leadership Concept and Challenge
As global public services has continue to explore new ways to improve their service delivery, unfortunately, there has been little improvement which has continue to poise a challenge to leaders of public organisations (West and Blackman, 2015).The emergence of new public management to new public value management from the traditional public administration were all necessitated by the demand for increase in competency in the public service.Thus, as a leader whose role is to ensure proper rules and procedures to be followed in traditional public administration while on the other hand they help meet performance targets in new public management (Yi, Berry, and Chen, 2018).However, in the public value management era, leaders in public organisations play the role of maintaining the overall capacity of the system through a complex process of interaction by pragmatic approaches (Cuganesan, Jacobs, and Lacey, 2014), therefore the creation of effective leaders was necessitated to effectively manage public organisations.
The concept of leadership has been subject to changes and variety of understanding by scholars and practitioners (Batmanghlich, 2015).More so, Leadership entails the organization and mobilization of both economic, political, social, financial and other resources for the purpose of accomplishment of a specified goals.Bernard Bass (one of the renowned scholar of leadership), defines leadership as a situation where by two or more people that are responsible for shaping of situation and setting of rules and behaviour interacts with each other to actualize the future prospects of the members.Leadership also happen when one group member revamp the skills and abilities of others in the same (Lyne de Ver, 2009).Therefore, concept of good and effective leadership transcends the possession of soft-power skills, hard-power skills but also the ability to know "when" and "how" to use the said skills (contextual intelligence).Nye ( 2008), defined leaders as individuals who aids a group, initiate and accomplish shared goals.
In the same direction, effective leader persuade followers into the right direction for the achievement of organizational goals.The style of leadership adopted and operated by organizations influences the performance of the organization.Exploring the relationship between organizational culture and the style of leadership using organizational culture, charismatic leadership, transformational leadership and transactional leadership, it Leadership Challenges in Democratization... was discovered that the leadership style adopted by leaders in organizations influence employee"s job satisfaction in public sector in Malaysia, with transformational leadership style haven the strongest relationship with job satisfaction (Nanjundeswaras and Swamy, 2014).
However, the adoption of effective management techniques by leaders in public organisations today has remain a challenge.Similarly, public organisations have continue to explore on the best leadership style to adopt for the realisation of common good (Abdul Manaf et al. 2017).This is because the transactional leadership is generally applied and effective in crisis and emergency situations (Odumeru and Feanyi, 2013), while the transformational leadership transform their followers through influencing their morale, ideals, interests, values as well as motivating them to perform their duties and responsibilities better than prior projections (Pieterse et al. 2010).
On the other hand, the creative leadership style is a leadership type in which the leader tries to invent new solutions through the use of imagination, skills as well as relevant concepts and theories.Creative leaders do not just stop at imitating what is already in existence, but also create new solutions to challenging situations.It is organisational changes that necessitates creative leadership style.As a result, for a leader to adopt creative leadership style for effective management of an organisation, there must be demonstration of outstanding competencies in technology master, problem solver, ambassador, change maker, great communicator and team player.Also, the democratic leadership style allows members of the organisation to take more participative role in the decision making process and encourages creativity and reward his followers (Parris and Peachey 2013).
As a basis for our analysis and presentation of facts, and to properly contextualize leadership, election management and the sustainability of INEC in Nigeria in the last 22 years, this study adopts the public sector leadership theory.The public sector leadership theory integrated transactional and transformational leadership styles into a comprehensive models in 1990s (Wart, 2007).According to Van Wart (2003), it was the way public administration was organised that prompted to exploration of new phenomenon of public sector leadership.He suggested that in public sector leadership, good administrative leaders take the responsibility in technical decision making by channelling policy decisions to their political superiors.
Moreover, this leadership theory sees leaders as those who are driven by worldwide government reform agenda by a kind of entrepreneurial thinking by public administrators.It tries to identify and define leadership in administrative context in the following manners: 1) Administrative leadership as the process of providing the results required by authorized processes in an efficient, effective and legal manner.
2) Administrative leadership as the process of developing followers who provide the results, by supporting them in the discharge of their responsibilities.
3) Administrative leadership as the process of alignment; that is to say it is the process of linking organisations with their environment, particularly the macro-level changes as well as realigning the culture as appropriate.
4) The service focus as the key element to administrative leadership.Here, leaders create a sense of public trust for their stewardship roles and dedication to the common good.
5) Administrative leadership as a tool for providing technical performance, internal directions to followers as well as external organisational direction, all through public service orientation ( Van-Wart, 2003).
In addition, one of the strength of the public sector leadership theory is that it has a hearty normative discussions on the role of administrators in a democratic system.However, one of the weakness of the literature in public sector leadership theory is that it fails to integrate the leadership characters.We have adopted this theory because, in Nigeria, periodic (1999, 2003, 2007, 2011, 2015 and 2019), elections have been conducted by INEC within the timeframe of this paper and there were series of complains and concern on the manner at which the electoral commission is been govern by the leaders in the helms of affairs of the commission.Consequently, generating conflicts, agitations, litigations, as well as the weak projection of the credibility of elections in Nigeria by both international and local observers.
Nigerian public organizations ineffectiveness are said to be due to slow in responding to technological changes & modern organizational methods, sycophantic because civil servants feel that it is safer to conform than initiate, poor work arrangement, highly hierarchical operational structure, un-streamlined organizational structures, lack of financial & material resources, corruption in virtually all affairs because of insecurity of tenure, poor remuneration, grossly indiscipline & negative poor ethics, as well as declining efficiency, effectiveness and productivity (Hamdok, 2010).These are largely influenced by leadership foresight and ability possess by those responsible for the management of the organization.
Although, some studies have been carried out on INEC of Nigeria, analysing the core factors that determine the independence of the electoral empire, the conduct of elections (duties of the electoral body) and the determinants of credible elections in Nigeria (Edet 2016;Ekundayo 2015;Mgba 2017;Muslim 2018;Odoziobodo 2015).However, there are only a few studies that focus on commission leadership perspectives.Therefore, in order to fill the huge academic lacuna, it is imperative that a study be conducted to explore the leadership challenges of the INEC as an EMB as well as identifying the most effective way those challenges can be addressed.there has been significant variation in the quality of elections, many well-known elections often use technology, resources and personnel innovatively and efficiently, and concerns about administrative problem, technological failures, incomplete electoral registers and wide spread of fraud.This variation is found in both established and transitional democracies (Van Ham and Lindberg, 2015).

III. Research Context: Indices of the INEC Leadership Performance in Nigeria
In Africa, most EMBs have failed to achieve credible elections outcome calling in to question the capacities of these bodies.Thus, elections results have been challenged severally as a result of poor organization of electoral process, suspicion of conspiracy between the governments in power to manipulate outcomes of elections or poor management practices.For instance, in Lesotho"s 2015 election, given the evident events of pre-election mood of distrust among the political leaders.There was also a weak performance of the electoral body in the areas of voter registration and structural instability.Additionally, in Morocco"s parliamentary election of October 2016, even with the series of reforms in early 2011 by King Mohammed VI in response to widespread protests, several studies has indicated that majority of Moroccans does not see the election without ills and failures (Norris, 2015).
Regrettably, in Nigeria the performance of the INEC has unfortunately become an impending source of crisis and a threat to the existence of the Nigerian state since the first republic.The widely perceived catastrophic failure of INEC in the April 2007 general elections was only one manifestation of leadership failure of antecedent electoral umpires in the Nigerian first, second and third republics (Ijim-agbor, 2007).
For instance, the Perceptions of Electoral Integrity (PEI) report which compares the quality of elections around the world ranked Nigeria: 53; global mean: 56 (The evidence gathered by the Electoral Integrity Project (EIP) compares elections and any problems diagnosed across all eleven components of the electoral cycle).Experts in this regards have evaluated the political finance sub-section with a score "20" (global mean: 36), putting Nigeria in the lowest ten elections of 2015 in that regard (Norris 2015), as illustrated in the figure below: The above figure has shown a relatively poor indices of the INEC leadership performance in Nigeria in aspect of electoral laws, district boundaries, voter registration, media coverage, campaign finance, voting process and electoral authorities.Therefore, a substantial portion of problems confronting elections and electoral process in Nigeria"s democratic history is connected to behavioural and attitudinal inclinations of the political elite as shown above, consequently, a great portion of the blame must be on the leaders of the electoral empire that have been saddled with responsibility of conducting elections in Nigeria (Odoziobodo, 2015).
Thus, poor leadership in INEC has led to delay in the publications of election results which created political and economic instability in the country.In uttermost case it has led to wrong candidate winning and therefore affects the confidence in electoral process (Akwen, Jooji, and Moorthy, 2018).According to Moveh (2015), as an electoral umpire, INEC has been confronted with numerous number of leadership crisis and challenges in almost all its electoral management since its establishment.The INEC is confronted with credibility problems, because most citizens lost confidence in its capacity to organize free, credible and transparent elections.All elections conducted by INEC From 1999-2019 have been criticized on the basis of being riddled with various problems, resulting in questionable outcomes.INEC lacks financial, institutional and administrative independence, evidenced by its funding and composition by the presidency, as well as its lack of professional staff and security of tenure for officials (Edet 2016;Okafor and Agu 2019).
Absent of effective and efficient leaders in the INEC has seriously affected the professional and administrative capacity of the commission, which has adversely affected the credibility of electoral process and democracy in the country.INEC under the leaderships of Justice Ephraim Akpata (1998-2000), Sir Abel Guobadia (2000-2005) and Professor Maurice Iwu (2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010) encountered several controversies and criticisms by the European Union (EU) observer mission report.This was largely blamed on the perceived deficiency in the commission"s professional and administrative competencies resulting to long manifestation of irregularities in the management of elections by the electoral umpire.According to the EU election observer mission (2011), Musa (2011), Ebirim (2013), Obah-Akpowoghaha (2013), between 1999 to 2003 results of the elections were to a great extent condemned due to poor organisation, lack of transparency, violence, widespread procedural irregularities and observable level of fraud (T.James et al. 2016;Mgba 2017;Orji 2015).
Professor Maurice Iwu"s tenure spanning from 2005 to 2010 was even the worst in comparison to his predecessors as observed by EU Election Observers and the opposition.The election that he conducted in 2007 was marred with serious controversies of massive irregularities and favouritism, making Nigeria"s election to fall below acceptable democratic standards as observed by Nigerians and foreign observers.In fact, the winner of the presidential election, president Umaru Musa Yar"adua, admitted this in his acceptance speech during his oath-taking last May 2007(Chukwudi 2015).Professor Attahiru Jega who succeeded Professor Maurice Iwu in 2010, claimed that for an effective electoral administration in the country there was need for investment in technology, which will result in high technological registration process and in staffing on the part of the electoral umpire, thus, will lead to credible elections.In fact, the elections conducted by Jega in 2015 were considered to be improving, the truth is professional and administrative capacities of the electoral umpire needs leaders who can consolidate on the pace, by building the best human resource management that will promote electoral integrity, effective management system design as well as better use of technology (T. S. James, 2013).
Moreover, the present INEC boss, Professor Mahmoud Yakubu, who replaced Professor Jega in 2015 have continued to face persistent challenge of reforms needed for more efficient EMB in Nigeria such as electronic transmission of election results, creation of additional polling units, successful election conduct as well as logistics challenges (Osisanwo, 2021).Also, there is consistent low turnout rates of voters due to separatist agitations, terrorism, banditry and communal clashes (Dahir, 2019).
However, the institutions that carryout electoral processes are critical to democracy and the entire nation.As a crucial agency in a democratic cycle, the function of an EMB such as the INEC in Nigeria is obviously of prominence in the process of transition to and consolidation of democracy.Therefore, it is imperative that a study be undertaken to explore the challenges of commission leadership and to offer solutions to those challenges so as to enable INEC to respond to both internal and external opportunities using creative endeavors, processes and procedures.

IV. The Challenges of EMB in case of INEC in Nigeria
In the course of the study, it was discovered that the challenges of EMB in case of INEC in Nigeria is historically linked with class interest and class ideology which are associated with other variables such as inadequate manpower, political elites" manipulation, inadequate training, ad-hoc staff problems, inadequate funding, lack of technological know-how, absence of financial autonomy, absence of standard operating system, poor cooperation by the electorates and political inference.Political Interference: Political elites" manipulation in terms of interference in the administrative composition of the INEC also identified as a major challenge affecting the administrative capacity of the commission.

Inadequate Training:
Training is a vital strategy of instilling particular skill or behaviour for staff.Accordingly, training create a skilled workforce for the future, however in the case of INEC training of its staff has become a major challenge due to inadequate finances and proper planning in the commission.
Ad-hoc Staff Problems: Problems arising due to the complexity of INEC activities in terms of electoral management processes has become a consistent crisis to the commission.This is because of the limited number of workforce in the commission which has necessitated the engagement of temporary staff known as the ad-hoc staff whose main responsibility is to accomplish the task of an effective election (Sule, Sani, and Mat 2018).However, the ad-hoc staff have limited knowledge and skill to exercise its function therefore, have been created an administrative lacuna for the commission over the years.
Inadequate Manpower: lack of not only qualified but also suitable employees has constituted problems in relation to administrative capacity of the commission.Shortage of workforce, unprofessional leadership as well as under-trained personnel have negatively affected the manpower of the commission.

Lack of Technical Know-how:
Most of the leaders in INEC are not acquainted with modern technological skills to operate innovative tools affectively.This constituted a major challenge to the effective management of the commission.
Absence of Financial Autonomy: INEC as an independent autonomous body, solely responsible for the conduct of free, fair and equitable political contest between divergent parties and individuals ought to have an absolute financial freedom from any arm of government, but the case of INEC is otherwise, in that the finances of the commission is largely controlled by the executive arm of government in Nigeria.This has constituted an administrative bottleneck for the execution of its programs and activities for smooth running of the commission by the leaders.

Absence of Standard Operating System:
There is no official regulation and instructions compiled by the commission to help carry out routine operations which is directed towards achieving efficiency, uniformity, quality output and reduce miscommunication and inability to consolidate organizational rules and regulations.
Poor Cooperation by the Electorates: INEC as an EMB in Nigeria finds it very difficult to effectively manage the divergent population in the country.This is because Nigeria is a heterogeneous country with divergent demography and geographical distribution of different ethnic group.
Political Interference: despite being an independent EMB in Nigeria, INEC in Nigeria has been administrative constrained by continues interference by the executive arm of government particularly in area of appointment of its leader and other principal officers of the commission.
The above identified challenges have contributed in weakening the leadership of INEC in the country, hence, these made it very difficult for leaders in Nigeria"s EMB to take decisive or radical decision that will enable them to move the commission to a greater height.Moreover, the study revealed that the establishments of various policies in INEC such as engagement of ad-hoc staff, voters" education, training & retraining, introduction of PVC, political parties registration, introduction of e-voting, judicious use of funds and provision of adequate electoral materials have promulgated numerous numbers of innovation which led to the sustenance of service delivery of INEC in Nigeria.Training & Retraining: In order to develop a skilled workforce, there has been continues training and training of both permanent and ad-hoc staff of the commission.This to a large extent has sustained service delivery in the commission.

Introduction of Permanent Voters' Card (PVC):
The introduction of a PVC which serves as a non-renewable identity of voters by the commission has to a large extent sustained service delivery in the commission by providing a pool of voters in the country.

Political Parties' Registration:
The registration of political parties by INEC as well as deregistration of dormant political parties has a large extent created a control on political proliferation of political parties in the country, therefore, creating a control on political party activities by the commission.

Introduction of E-voting:
The introduction of electronic card reader machine in 2011 elections has assisted in making the electoral system less cumbersome in the country.This has enhanced and sustained the administrative output of INEC as an EMB in Nigeria.

Judicious Use of Funds:
The financial discipline exhibited by the INEC leaderships has to a large extent sustained the service delivery of the commission.For instance the procurement and deployment of card reader machines by the commission from 2011 to date has projected the commission"s financial discipline, thus sustaining service delivery in the commission.

Provision of Adequate Electoral Materials:
The provision of adequate election materials such as ballot papers, result sheets, card reader machines during elections has greatly enhanced service delivery of the commission.
In line with the above challenges identified by the informants, it was discovered that the challenges can be mitigated by enhancing innovation, reforms, full autonomy, training and retraining of staff, sensitization programs, enhancement of voting machine, provision of adequate funding and employment of permanent staff.Embrace Innovation: For a better electoral process, leadership in INEC as well the electorate must accept all innovations especially the modern technological tools introduced by the commission such as the PVC, card reader machine etc.
Reforms: These has to do with the creation and generation of policies that will ensure the smooth running of the commission.
Full Autonomy: INEC as an independent EMB must be guaranteed full autonomy without any interference by any arm of government.
Sensitization Programs: INEC must also ensure constant awareness and educational programs are made to the general public particularly on the conduct of election.

Enhancement of Voting Machine:
The voting machine known as the card reader needs upgrade time to time so as to meet up with the technological dynamism of the electoral system.
Provision of Adequate Funding: Without doubt, elections generally comes with tremendous financial implication.Therefore, in order to address the financial inadequacy of the commission, leadership as well as government most device means to provide adequate finances needed by the commission.
Employment of more Permanent Staff: For effective and efficient running of the EMB, INEC need to ensure the recruitment of more suitable workforce that will enhance service delivery by the commission.

V. Conclusion
Considering the study above, it is justifiable to conclude that leadership in the INEC has not relatively change the administrative efficiency in the commission.This is more of a mirage than a reality, because successive leadership in INEC has contributed very little in terms of addressing the salience leadership challenges in the commission.However, it is evident that the transformational leadership styles adopted by some of the leaders in INEC have largely enhanced the administrative capacity of the commission.Therefore, the study recommends that there is urgent need for leadership of INEC to imbibe new administrative practices that will enhance the professionalism of the leadership in the commission.There is also the need to revise certain duplicitous functions in the commission, so as to save funds for meaningful and purposeful elections in the country.Only in this way can the leadership at INEC take firm roots in the country"s electoral system, thus, derives the nourishing ingredients of democratic growth, maturity and consolidation.
Developing countries EMBs like INEC in Nigeria are been confronted with increasingly leadership impediments due to lack of technological usage, integrity on the Leadership Challenges in Democratization... 14 Yustisia Volume 12 Number 1 (April 2023)

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this empirical investigation, the study focused on the leadership challenges faced by INEC for the effective discharge of its responsibility from 1999 to 2019.Although, Leadership Challenges in Democratization... 18 Yustisia Volume 12 Number 1 (April 2023)

Figure 1 :
Figure 1: Challenges Faced by INEC Leaders from 1999 to 2019

Figure 2 :
Figure 2: The role of INEC Leaders in Sustaining Service Delivery