OPINION

Mar 9, 2010 — Akron Beacon Journal

Laura Ofobike

Mar. 9, 2010 (McClatchy-Tribune Regional News delivered by Newstex) -- It takes me roughly eight minutes to drive from my house to the church hall where my precinct votes on election days. In most elections, it takes about the same amount of time to go through the ballot and head out of there. I spend more time in grocery lines catching up on alien visitations and the lives of the infamous rich than I ever have exercising the right to vote.

As most of our elections are in the early spring and fall, the biggest hazards we are likely to encounter (this far north, anyway) don't range too far from spine-tingling cold weather and the prospect of getting wet between parking lot and voting booth.

Of course, occasionally, administrative glitches -- say, changes in voting location or a shortage of voting machines and ballots -- may cause confusion and delay. But by and large, the inconveniences in making choices about who will govern our society and how come nowhere close to run-of-the-mill hassles we accept. Imagine for a moment how often one could vote in the time it takes to clear airport security or receive emergency-room care.

Following news reports about the Iraqi election this weekend was thought-provoking: The trouble with our elections over here is that they have become altogether routine and easy. In a sense, it has become too comfortable and mechanical a process for our own good. Vote or sit out all elections, and there is little chance the life you know would be up-ended.

Over here, the reasons we find to justify not voting are legion: Too cold, too wet, too many people in line. No time, no ride, no parking, no candidates worth the effort. . . .

Iraq and several other countries in the recent past have been a study in the elemental power of the act of voting. For large numbers of people, the decision to vote in elections remains, literally, a statement of character, in some cases a decision with life-and-death consequences.

It is an amazing thing to see millions of people with everything to lose put their lives on the line simply to make a choice and be heard. In the weeks before Iraq's parliamentary vote Sunday, insurgents issued warnings strong enough to curdle blood. They offered a stark choice: Stay home or risk being blown up. Across Iraq, bombings backed up the threats. One account reported dozens of mortar and rocket attacks in Baghdad, Falluja and other cities on Sunday morning.

And yet millions of voters paid no heed, defying threats of a reign of terror against their families and neighborhoods if they went to the polls.

The darkest threats I need to consider at the approach of elections may be campaign claims that voting for So-and-So or approving this or that issue would mean starving my grandbabies or driving grandma to an early grave. These might give pause, but they are not in the same league as a bazooka blast into the neighborhood or polling station or a suicide bomber in the marketplace.

How many bullets would I dodge to vote? How far would I drive if there was any likelihood a rocket might whizz into the nearest voting site? Would I vote if a machete-wielding rogue were hunting me down? Or if a secret police were taking down names at rallies and paying midnight visits?

I would much rather I didn't need to think about an answer to any such questions.

But those are some of the options voters find themselves weighing in many countries. The Iraqis who have defied death threats to cast ballots in this and previous elections are no more unique in their courage than Afghan women who went to the polls, anyway, last year in spite of similar threats. Or, for that matter, Zimbabwean voters who sought to replace the brutal autocracy of President Robert Mugabe. Or Green Movement Iranians sporadically protesting a lost presidential election in June last year.

There is no lack of evidence that people hungry to be heard would fight to the death to secure or assert their right to vote. Minority populations here and elsewhere have endured a great many indignities and brutalities to be able to walk freely to a ballot box.

South Africa offered an unforgettable instance of the act of voting as a statement of power in 1994. Able to vote freely for the first time in a national election, black South Africans trudged for miles and stood countless hours in winding lines to choose a president. With their ballots, they marked an end to an era of inhuman treatment.

Where there is little or no degree of separation between voting and its consequences, inconvenience pales in the decision to vote or not to vote.

Ofobike is the Beacon Journal chief editorial writer. She can be reached at 330-996-3513 or by e-mail at lofobike@thebeaconjournal.com

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