Mandate – Implications & Applications

By Austin Isikhuemen

A political mandate is the authority to carry out a policy, regarded as given by the electorate to a party or candidate that wins an election. As elections are the only accepted mode of leadership attainment in a democratic setting, this definition is therefore a reference to nations (and sub-nationals) who have chosen the democratic route to governance. This is a requirement by the grundnom called the constitution, whether written, as in the United States and Nigeria, or unwritten, as applies in Britain. This does not apply, for instance, to Kim Jong Un’s North Korea where the ruler is the law.

The mandate is assumed given once election is won, legally, by a political party or candidate. A mandate is not given in a vacuum or carte blanc. It is based on the sum total of what the candidate and his party, the platform for political power contestation, promise the electorate during electioneering campaigns. Such promises are documented in a manifesto. The electioneering campaigns provide the opportunity for the candidate and his/her party to share these promises and plans with view to convincing the voters to give him/her their mandate to better their lot through the implementation of his/her manifesto.

It therefore implies that the election of a political party is an indication that majority of the voters believe that that party’s manifesto, when faithfully implemented, will improve their living conditions and take their polity to a better place. It is also a repudiation by the majority of the voters of the manifestoes of those who lost, or, at best, that their plans are less likely to take the people to where they want to be. A loss could also be interpreted as a rejection of the candidate or his party based on antecedents and voters impressions, no matter how subjective.

A mandate, freely given, is a solemn trust by the people who put their immediate future, based on the constitutional tenure, in the guiding hands of the elected, with the implicit belief that he will, in all his/her decisions, policies and programmes, put their interest first. The instrument for checking faithful adherence to the promises is that document, the manifesto, and a fearless legislature which is unfazed by the executive to demand accountability on behalf of the people they represent.

What if the mandate was not freely given? What if leadership was taken at gunpoint as in a military coup, or stolen via election manipulation and rigging? Does a valid mandate exist in such situations? What is the basis of commitment to the people when in such cases a real mandate does not exist or is, at best, tenuous? The power holder, knowing he/she was really not elected by the majority of voters, or that he/she got the leadership mantle through a risky self-help that could have cost him his life had it gone wrong, is likely to ride roughshod over the people or merely pretend to have their interest at heart. Pandering to other forces will inevitable become an attractive, even feasible recourse.

The manifesto of a candidate can be populist, and designed to persuade the general public and the voters that utopia is within reach through his/her leadership. They can play on primordial sentiments and crude calls to obfuscating, meaningless mantra cloaked in nationalism, sometimes, religious bigotry or ‘traditional’ ethos. It is when the manifesto unfolds through the unveiling of policy thrusts and implementation that, sometimes, people begin to realise that elections have serious implications. As seen in Washington DC some weeks back.

Even for a leadership whose election, and consequently, mandate, is not in dispute, the electorate can get surprises that make them rue the thought process that made them vote the way they did. Some US Republicans are in this mode following the catastrophe that played out at the Whitehouse when uncouth bullying took the place of diplomatic discussions with a supposed ally. That finger-pointing, cantankerous, pugnacious duo are the mandate bearers and are doing what they promised but in way the sane voters and allies across the Atlantic pond never expected. But the crude methodology may yet yield the result, injured egos and aghast allies not withstanding.

Nearer home in Edo, the matter of who actually got the mandate reached a landmark crescendo at the litigation stage on the 3rd of March 2025. The venue was far away from Benin City due to fear for the lives of the adjudicators and, lets face it, the plaintiffs and their legal team. The shootings close to the Tribunal’s seating venue, the rowdy atmosphere in the premises where known faces pursued security providers in broad daylight with government security agents looking on helplessly or even being threatened themselves, made the relocation to Abuja inevitable. It is a shame that Edo could not provide a secure environment for a civil litigation process.

The majority of the citizens of Edo expect the tribunal to do justice and make known the true mandate holder in the September 21 election. INEC said it was the current office holder that the people elected and gave their mandate. Did INEC prove so at the tribunal? Did the party and the said winner – Senator Monday Okpebholo – and their witnesses, successfully, legally buttress that assertion? Did the plaintiff, Dr. Asue Ighodalo and his legal team, successfully debunk the INEC conclusion and pronouncement which they assert were based on incorrect computations and deliberate non-adherence to their own rules and the Electoral Act 2022? Only the Tribunal can tell, legally speaking. The people wait.

They wait for the Tribunal to do justice, not technicality. They wait, trusting that the expected pronouncement when finally made, would satisfy the majority who voted on 21st September 2024. The real winner, based on facts and law, should be pronounced, without fear or favour. They wait to see whether justice, at any stage in this judicial process, is beholden to influencing potentates as widely threatened by some or feared by others. They wait, to see whether the Judiciary will redeem itself by being seen to adhere scrupulously and fearlessly to the rule of law, both the letters and the spirit.

They wait, because Edo’s forward match to a future of hope and prosperity or matching on the same spot, even reverse motion to underdevelopment, depends on giving the mandate to the people’s choice. Their faith in the electoral process and institutions, and consequently, the nature of their future participation, whether it is going to be enthusiastic or cynically tepid, currently hang in the balance. They wait!!!

Austin Isikhuemen, a public affairs analyst, writes from Lagos and edited by Barth Ikiebe.