The Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA) promises an interesting encounter with the unpacking of the elections-democracy puzzle in Africa Friday, February 6th, 2026. That is when another of its Foreign Policy Lecture series is scheduled to hold on “Elections and Democracy in Africa”, according to an NIIA event flyer made available to Intervention.
The lecture poses what can be called the puzzles in town at the moment and it goes like this: The conduct and credibility of elections have been historical sites of disquiet in Africa. That is contrary to what explains the primacy of elections in liberal democracy: the idea that no (wo)man is so good to be entrusted with power without the entrusting other’s consent. Is it then electoral crisis that explains the (un)making of democracy across the world today in general and Africa in particular or is it democracy itself that makes credible elections problematic in Africa?
On hand to deal with the question is Nigeria’s Prof Adele Jinadu, a veteran intellectual and observer of electoral ‘gymnastics’ on the continent for decades.
The lecture could, against the background of the lecturer and the global discontent regarding democracy at the moment, turn out a paradigm-bursting intervention from Nigeria, especially if the active segment of the civil society takes it to the ‘next level’.
