APC chairman Abdullahi Ganduje
The back-to-back victories of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the recent off season governorship elections in Edo and Ondo states, with wide margins, point to the weakening of the opposition parties and the possibility of a slide to a one party system if care is not taken. In this report, Onyedika Agbedo dissects the outcomes of the polls and the posturing of the APC, pointing out how to safeguard the nation’s democracy through transparent elections.
The outcomes of the recent off season governorship elections in Edo and Ondo states underscored the crisis in the opposition camp and the gravitation of the country towards a one-party state. Ahead of the elections, the opposition parties, led by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), bragged that their candidates would win in a free and fair contest. They cited the biting hardship in the country, which they claimed has made Nigerians disenchanted with the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and repeatedly urged the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the law enforcement agencies to demonstrate neutrality in the process.
However, the results announced by INEC at the end of the contests indicated a resounding victory for the ruling party. In fact, against expectations that it would be difficult for APC to retain Ondo State following the crisis that erupted in its fold in the state by the sickness and eventual death of former governor Rotimi Akeredolu, the party won in all the 18 local councils of the state. Its candidate, the incumbent Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa polled a total of 366,781 votes to defeat Agboola Ajayi of the PDP, who got 117,845 votes.
In Edo State, the APC candidate, Monday Okpebholo, emerged victorious with 291,667 votes, defeating Asue Ighodalo of the PDP who garnered 247,274 votes and Olumide Akpata of the Labour Party (LP) who polled 22,763 votes. Okpebholo won in 11 local councils of the state while Ighodalo won in seven.
At the end of both polls, the opposition cried foul; alleging various irregularities. For instance, reacting to the outcome of the Ondo poll, PDP’s Ajayi, accused INEC of comprise, noting that, “we have uncovered lots of actions undertaken to compromise the electoral desires of the people and sadly conclude that democracy cannot thrive in an environment where unabated criminality is perpetually perpetrated in the prosecution of an election by the agencysaddled with the onerous and sacred responsibility to protect our franchise and deliver its mandate at the end of every election.”
The Social Democratic Party (SDP) also rejected the outcome of the poll, describing the election as a “show of shame.” The party alleged widespread harassment and intimidation of its agents.
On his part, the deputy governorship candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in the election, Dayo Awude, said: “I do hope and pray that vote trading will become a thing of the past in our electoral system.
“There is no gainsaying the fact that the show of naira force that was at play in this election decided where the pendulum of victory swung. I would have been happier if this victory was won without the vote bazaar that characterised it.
“So long as vote buying remains the decider of election results in our clime, accountability and good governance may continue to elude us.” Amid the complaints, the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu charged the aggrieved candidates to seek redress in court. In a statement last Sunday by his Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, the President, who commended the peaceful conduct of the election, enjoined the political actors to allow their orderly conduct to permeate the post-election activities and processes.
The Presidency had issued a similar statement after the result of the Edo governorship election was announced, a stark reminder to the days of the PDP in power between 1999 and 2015 when they taunted the opposition after every election victory by asking them to go to court.
Meanwhile, buoyed by the victories, the APC has declared its bold ambition to bring more states into its fold. The party is also plotting to rule Nigeria “for a very long time”, according to its National Chairman, Abdullahi Ganduje.
While reacting to the party’s victory in last Saturday’s poll in Ondo State, Ganduje noted that the victories of the party in Edo and Ondo states governorship elections were not a fluke but an attestation that Nigerians had embraced the APC as their party.
He also disclosed that the next target of the party is to claim Osun and Oyo states. His words: “In this geopolitical zone, we must deliver 100 per cent in favour of APC; therefore, Ondo state must be at the forefront. The two other states, I will not reveal our secret, but we assure you, we are strategising. Everything must be 100 per cent behind President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
“Our next target in the Southwest, and you know we are good at hitting our targets, is Osun State and Oyo State. We assure you that we will do all that is possible to bring them into the fold,” Ganduje said.
With the APC being good at hitting its targets, is Nigeria heading towards a one-party state? Why have the opposition parties turned to barking dogs that cannot bite as evidenced in the outcomes of the recent polls? What is the pathway to a competitive multi-party democracy, especially ahead of the 2027 general election?
A political communication scholar, Dr. Tayo Popoola, believes that the electoral umpire, the judiciary and security agents must carry out their duties religiously to safeguard the nation’s democracy.
His words: “You mentioned Edo and Ondo states but beyond Edo and Ondo what about those local council elections that we have had across the country? I am worried about the way we are practicing our democracy. This is not a single party arrangement; we are operating a multi-party system in which at every election, nothing less than five political parties usually vie for the various political positions. The normal trend is that we know that there must be a winner because the system we are running is what we call first past the post system. There will be a candidate or political party with the highest votes; then there will be second and there will be third. That of Ondo is amazing – 18/0. Is it a football match? That was the question I asked. In Edo the women protested but after a while they kept quiet.
“In the local council elections, I have seen a pattern that has been very strange in Nigerian politics since electioneering started in the country in 1923. It is the party that produces the governor that clears all the seats. That is not good for democracy. And they are even boasting now that they will be there for as long as they please.”
Popoola, who lectures in the Department of Mass Communication, University of Lagos, cautioned the APC against being boastful, saying: “I want to remind them that we had a similar scenario during the NPN era in the Second Republic. The late Ozumba Mbadiwe described the 1983 election as an “airslide”. We had been hearing of landslide victories in elections but he described that of 1983 as an “airslide” for his party. We all knew what happened. That democracy collapsed on December 31, 1983 a few months after that government was inaugurated.” He faulted the way politics is being played in the country, urging INEC to sit up.
“People are already saying that INEC is compromising and it has become a narrative in every election that is conducted under this dispensation. And when people are complaining, they will say if you don’t like the outcome of the election “go to court.” They are now using the judiciary to validate illegitimacy; they are now using the judiciary to legitimise illegality. The judiciary too should sit up. Let the judiciary live up to expectations. If there has been rigging, let the judiciary give a true verdict of how the election went. The court has the prerogative to cancel elections or order a rerun or to say, ‘no you didn’t win, this is the party or candidate that won the election.’ The judiciary in democracy all over the world is the last home of the common man.
Okorie
“So, let INEC sit up. INEC should address all the areas that can erode the confidence of the people in the ballot box. Specifically, some people were caught buying votes with amounts ranging from N10,000 to N30,000. It is against the electoral law. All the people that have been apprehended by the security agents violating the electoral law should be promptly investigated and arraigned. Without such measures taken and those perpetrators severely sanctioned, the confidence of the people in the ballot box might disappear.
“We need to save this democracy; we toiled for it; we struggled for it. Now we have it; a repeat of what General Gowon said in 1975, that the civilians have not learnt their lessons, must not be allowed.” Popoopla argued that even if the country should become a one-party state, it should naturally evolve.
“This one is not a normal way one party state should emerge. If a one-party state will emerge, it should emerge as a result of the fact that people are in love with the party in power, people are expressing their support for the party in power because they are delivering democracy dividends to the people. But there is this general notion in the country that they are impoverishing the people so that at election time when they (politicians) give them a little money they will vote for them. A one-party state should evolve naturally.
“And in Africa, if you go into history, all those States where we have a one-party dictatorship, which has developed as expected; because the development of the country is always an argument in favour of one-party system. The argument is that the opposition usually delays decision making but if you have a one-party structure, decisions will be taken very fast, leading to the development of the country. Tell me which of the one-party states in Africa that has developed?”
For an elder statesman and founder of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Chief Chekwas Okorie, the incumbency factor still influences participation in the country’s electoral process, and even the outcomes.
Okorie said: “The people seem to have lost the confidence that the electoral body will be neutral in the election process. They believe that they always tend to pander to the whims and caprices of those in power at that particular constituency. And when you look at it, you will see that that fear is not far-fetched because only people in government, controlling government treasury, can afford to outbid anyone else in vote buying. I am not saying that they are the only ones who buy votes; but they can afford to outbid anybody else in that unfortunate development in our political process that votes are now purchased in the open.
“The experience that I have had when I led candidates to elections is that even when you draw the attention of the law enforcement agents and even INEC official that ought to monitor the process to the kiosks of the vote buyers, where they pay people who provide evidence that they voted for their parties, they seem to have a choreographed answer – our duty is to maintain order and not to go after those who are buying votes. And therefore, if you feel aggrieved, go and bring your own money and buy and they will not arrest you. With that type of response, where are you going to bring your own money and buy?”
According to him, that is why recent election results seem to be skewed in favour of those who have a large purse. He, however, warned that “if we do not do something about it, this can also boil over and those who may wish to resort to self help may do that, which will not augur well for our country, especially as we are going into a general election in a few years time.”
He added: “Therefore, I suggest that the National Assembly has a responsibility to give us an electronic voting system in our electoral system. That will mean that any person who has a smartphone can vote from anywhere and it will be recorded at the ward where he registered. It means that there will be more voter participation; it means that you will not have to shut down the economy because there is an election going on – even Ghana has achieved that. It also means that there is no ballot box to cart away as manual voting will only be for the very few who don’t have smartphones.
“So, when you have a system that makes it easy for votes to count and people know that votes count, you will be experiencing up to 80 to 85 per cent participation. Look at the percentage of people who voted in the U.S. election; it’s over 80 per cent. But here we are operating below 30 per cent participation. So, in the actual sense, you cannot even say the people have spoken.
“So, if the National Assembly is ready to help the country out, they can do that by passing a law that mandates INEC to adopt electronic voting. This is the legal framework that I have been canvassing since 2012 and every election tends to strengthen the need to do that.” On the go to court mantra of the APC, Okorie recalled that it was the PDP that started it.
“I remember the person who made it popular was the late Ojo Maduekwe. Now that the PDP is at the receiving end, they are beginning to complain. When in 2012 I did a memo on electronic voting as the chairman of UPP, and gave it to the Presidency and the entire members of the National Assembly, they gave us the opposite of what we asked for. They went and added a new clause in Section 54 or so of the Electoral Act to say electronic voting shall not be used in Nigeria for the time being. When PDP lost the presidential election to APC in 2015, former president Goodluck Jonathan became one of the highest canvassers for electronic voting; because he has also gone to many countries as a former president where he was invited to observe elections and lead in peace making. He saw what electronic voting has done to reduce tension after elections and came back to Nigeria and started canvassing it.
“The next effort I am going to make is to lead another crusade to have all Nigerian citizens of voting age to pressure their representatives in the National Assembly to enact a law on electronic voting if they want them to participate in the electoral process. Let’s see whether that can persuade the National Assembly members because they will be paying lip service to the issue, as APC has the majority in the National Assembly today. But when the table turns and they are at the receiving end, as it turned against PDP, they will begin to see what we are saying,” he said.
The former presidential candidate warned that unless Nigerians toe this path, they would continue to hear “go to court” from whichever party that controls the levers of power in the country.
“In fact, things might even get worse and if nothing is done towards 2027, I can tell you that you are going to be experiencing the mobilisation of private armies for election purposes and that is not going to be good for the country,” he warned.
The Guardian
