The Executive Direc
tor of Media Rights Agenda, Lagos, Mr Edetaen Ojo once asserted that conflicts are a part of the democratic process, which is a manifestation of the interaction between opposing views.  According to him, the competition of ideas and views from a variety of sources is the essence of any democratic arrangement, but averred that it should be managed to draw out the best of ideas for the making  of choices by the electorate.
In most democratic systems of the world, this assertion is sacrosanct. In Nigeria, for instance, conflicts or electoral violence have become powerful indicators of ineffective communion and policing of elections.  Poor communication among politicians and their supporters as well as technological and logistic problems arise in the course of elections, which contribute to violence.  In fact, conflict in Nigeria during elections is an inherent element. It is obvious that when competing parties insist on the posture of winning by all means, there must occur conflicts, sometimes, violent conflicts since the parties have conflicting interests.
It is against this backdrop that the Civil Society Organisations ( CSOs) and the media  in Nigeria decided to form a synergy ahead of the 2015 general elections.  At an awareness workshop put together by the centre for Civic Education, known as the Transition Monitoring Group, (TMG) and sponsored  by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Enugu recently, the two groups from the South-East geo-political zone signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the purpose of proper monitoring and reporting of the polls before, during and after.
The MoU provided for a mutual partnership between them on the best way to ensure sustainable democracy in the country.  Dr Ogbu, an associate professor of law at the Odumegwu Ojukwu University and South East Zonal Coordinator of TMG, explained that since it was difficult to deploy election monitors to the 120,000 polling units across the country, a representative sample of areas to cover would be adopted.  This, he noted, would also help to find out all that would happen in the various polling units by the use of communication gadgets and collated reports forwarded to the headquarters of the organisation in Abuja.
In her paper, a resource person, Dr Ifeoma Dunu of the Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka said, “as the 2015 elections draw nearer, we should realise that we are at the threshold of deciding the fate of this country for the next decade and as such, it becomes imperative that we use whatever we have at our disposal to get it right”. As she put it, “To achieve free and fair election and ensure credibility of the electoral process, the media reportage of electoral events, must uphold the code of ethics for journalists”, adding that good journalistic practice in election reporting must take cognizance of accuracy, responsibility, the fairness doctrine, balance reporting and conflict sensitive reporting.
In actual sense, the Nigerian media should at this time of the country’s general election ensure that all these are done despite the enormous challenges facing them.  There is a clear lack of professionalism in some sections of the media as the journalists sometimes fail to properly verify information resources before reporting, and this sometimes heightens tension during election period and could result in conflict.  The media must bear in mind that their coverage and reportage of the 2015 elections would go a long way in determining the success of the elections and stability of the country.
Violent conflict during election endangers the democratic process because it undermines the integrity of the electoral process and the freewill of the electorate to make democratic choices.  The rate of violence pervading parts of the country must be given serious attention before it goes out of control.  Nigeria should not be made to plunge into another war-like crisis because of a few individuals desperate to grab power only for their selfish interests.
Election violence in Nigeria dates as far back as 1959 when men and women were involved in electoral violence although there has been a notable reduction in the level of election violence since that period. Evaluating the transition to civil rule in 1998 and 1999, one would say that those elections were mostly peaceful and this could be attributable to the fact that the elections were supervised by the military since people were aware that violent eruptions would be met with force.  But we cannot forget that there was electoral violence in some parts of the country such as the Niger Delta where elections were not conducted as a result of threats of boycotts and unrest in those areas.  Youths destroyed ballot papers and frightened prospective voters through firing of gun-shots.

Shedie Okpara