The Big Brother Naija, popularly referred to as BBNaija Reality TV Show has ended with a groundbreaking record where the winner got 60% of the total votes for five final housemates. The show, despite all the criticism, tends to address one problem that is affecting Nigerians and how Nigerian youths want this to be done, the voting system.
One thing unique about the show is that the idea is tapped from a book, George Orwell’s “1984.” In “1984,” Orwell projects a period in the world where everyone will have to fix their eyes on a screen 24/7 and those who failed to do so would be haunted by “Big Brother.”
Although Orwell foresees a draconian era in the book in which “Big Brother” represent but those who sell the idea to DSTV are able to turn the table around and make many youths listened to “Big Brother” thick voice.
The show gives the fictional authority in George Orwell’s “1984” a soul, controlled it, and made it fixed in the post-modern era, where everyone craves for free will, just as William Shakespeare projects Caesarean Section in “Macbeth.”
Although the reality TV Show has been criticized by many older generations who feel Nigerian youths are lazy for spending time to see the show, as it calls the attention of the youth to some things when it comes to self-development, so much it creates employments and sends a strong political message to the elders who have created a system where nothing is perfectly working for the country. Unfortunately, the older generations are not willing to leave the system for the new generation.
Politically, the BBNaija reality TV show has been able to display to the Nigerian government that the Nigerian youths actually want a system where voting would be transparent, reliable and that winner should emerge based on integrity and not (especially) material influence.
In late April 2010, former President Olusegun Obasanjo at a conference on democracy in Nigeria, in Washington DC, said, “With all due respect, if Jesus Christ could come to the world and be the chairman of [the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC)], any election he would conduct will be disputed.”
Ten years after, Prof. Attahiru Jega, former chairman of INEC said that it is cleared that the Nigerian youths are demoralized and demobilized. He said this while analyzing President Muhammadu Buhari’s speech on the 60th Independent Anniversary. Although he admitted that the President’s speech is what we need now but posited that we need to go beyond paper and make all these come into reality.
For instance, BBNaija has a very transparent voting system that the voters can confidently boost of and the winner emerges as a result of his integrity and voters’ will rather than his material influence. Thus, the voting system gives a sense of participation in voting to the youth and tells the government to put in place, a transparent system that will encourage the youth.
Voting in BBNaija is carried out by an independent, private sector, Deloitte Nigeria. This is exactly what many Nigerian youths actually look forward to in elections, elections that give people a sense of confidence that their votes really count. An election that proves that it is not how rich, who your father, party, or godfather is, but the willingness of the people to make you a winner.
For instance, someone like Kiddwaya (one of the housemates) was evicted. Despite the fact that Kiddwaya’s father is a billionaire, who granted interviews with bigwigs such as BBC and Dele Momodu, with the projection of selling the name to youths who are to vote his son, but the majority ended not voting for his son, Kiddwaya.
On the day of the prize presentation to the winner, the organizer of the reality TV show disclosed that the show amassed 900 million votes. This is a testament that Nigerian youths got the sense of voting but want a positive sense of voting in the Nigerian system when someone the youths considered as a favorite, vote for the person, and their voting counts.
Nigerian youths want an independent electoral body, who will build their morale and makes voting really count. I think one of the ways to do this is to make the electoral body, press, and pressure groups the fourth tiers of government rather than being the subject of the executive and the legislature.
