Attahiru M. Jega 2.4 Lessons from the 2011 General Elections Some of the key lessons we learnt from the 2011 elections and those reviews that followed include: a. Good elections require adequate and timely planning: We have come to learn that there is no alternative to planning and preparing adequately. Election projects in a country like Nigeria are massive undertakings and require very professional planning. One of my favourite anecdotes about the 2011 elections is that in the registration of voters for the elections, the DDC machines we used would have formed a chain over 80 kilometres long if placed end to end; while the over 400,000 staff deployed for the exercise outnumbered the combined strength of the armed forces of the entire West African sub-region. And for the elections, we doubled that number of staff. That is the nature of massive deployment involved in the elections. Even if we discount the complex terrains over which we have to deploy, mobilize, deploy safely and retrieve close to a million workers and a huge quantity of materials is by any standard a huge project. Of course, planning is meaningless without adequate funding. This entails both adequate fund provisions and timely releases of such funds. We were lucky that we received the full support of the government in this regard in 2011, and we are pleased that this support is being replicated for the 2015 elections. b. Good elections are about effective partnerships and cooperation: We have also come to learn that running an election is a cooperative enterprise, not just a task for INEC alone. Within weeks in 2011, we were able to assemble and manage over 360,000 poll officials, mainly NYSC members, and another 240,000 security 32 Stakeholders and the Electoral Process in Nigeria: Review of 2011 Elections and Projections for 2015 officials to work at the polling unit level. Thousands of other security personnel were on patrol; while over 20,000 university staff, including vice chancellors, were enlisted to serve as collation and returning officers; besides thousands of local and foreign observers who witnessed the elections. Without the cooperation of various ministries, departments and agencies, especially the NYSC and security agencies that worked with us in ICCES, the conduct of the elections would indeed have been a difficult, if not an impossible mission. c. Good elections are about openness: Another lesson we learned from 2011 is the importance of openness in managing elections. There are two dimensions to this openness. First, it is important for an EMB to be open to new ideas that support creativity. At very difficult times, we were able to try new things and depend on the creativity of our staff. Secondly, it is important to be open to stakeholders by sharing information, openly discussing difficulties and taking responsibility when necessary. Related to openness is humility: humility to learn, humility to accept limitations, and humility to make corrections when necessary. d. Finally and perhaps the most important lesson of 2011 is that despite all the encomiums, the elections were by no means perfect: We at INEC were not only humbled by the praises, we have also been humble enough to realize that there is room for improvement. That was why our preparations for 2015 could be said to have begun immediately after the 2011 elections. 33