In order to coordinate the activities of the Independent Local Electoral Commissions (CELI), fifty-six magistrates were recently appointed by Yabre Dago, the President of the Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI), in accordance with Decree No. 2022-139/PR of 21 December 2022 establishing Independent Local Electoral Commissions. They will be responsible for preparing the elections at the local level. With these appointments made by decree, we are almost in the final stretch of the regional and legislative elections planned for this year. Barring a reversal of the situation, barring a miracle, the majority of Togolese will go to the polls to fulfill their duties as honest citizens. But is this the urgency, is this what worries the Togolese entangled more than ever in the slush of an economic crisis that is still just as devastating? Why this determination to privilege the political to the detriment of the social, the elections to a real inclusive policy which takes into account the social strata without recovery or propaganda? The doubt that citizens will not go to the polls with a flower in their arms is more than real? And those who will vote will do so more out of pure reflex than because they recognize themselves in Gnassingbé-style governance. The comments collected here and there testify to the indifference of the Togolese in the perspective of these deadlines. If they don’t have the heart to celebrate, they are even less so for a poll with results that are almost known in advance. It is one more waste to allocate money to elections that have never impacted people’s lives. Parrying the most urgent, that is what is reasonable.
Sodoli Koudoagbo
Source: The Corrector / lecorrecteur.info
