Divided they fell

Irrespective of whichever side of
the divide anyone belonged to, it
is undeniable that civil rule has come to stay in Nigeria; the country is making progress with its democracy despite all its imperfections. Such im- perfections also exist in other climes but get improved upon over time.

To date, the United States is not at ease explaining the concept of its electoral college as against popular votes. In 2016, Hillary Clinton won the popular vote but Donald Trump won the Electoral College. But they roll with it. The Electoral College result is the official result that determines a winner in their presidential election.

The deepening of Nigeria’s brand of democracy through the infusion of technology to further enhance the process, as experienced in the last general elections is commendable. It will be possible, in the near future, to transform the entire electoral process and embrace electronic voting which will minimize, if not eliminate, all the human errors experienced in the last presidential elections.

The introduction of BVAS was the acclaimed game changer which ensured that the people, real votes counted. Though the results of the election could not be transmitted real-time on the IReV as proposed by INEC; it did not in any way distort the outcome as expressed through the votes of the Nigerian people.

Not transmitting the result neither vitiates the outcome nor runs afoul of the Electoral Act 2022.

The 2023 presidential election was held on February 25, 2023, and the electoral umpire has declared Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) the winner with 8,794,726 votes rep- resenting 36.61 per cent of the total votes cast. Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Dem- ocratic Party came second with 6,984,520 votes representing 29.07 per cent of the total votes cast and the Labour Party’s candidate came third scoring 6,101,533 votes amounting to 25.40 percent.

Bracing up at the fourth position is Dr. Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, who scored 1,496,687 votes or 6.23 per cent of the total registered number of voters in the election.

The outcome of the highly competitive election is being disputed by both the PDP and the Labour Party. They are alleging the non-qualification of the winner on some grounds including an alleged indictment for narcotic offences in the United States more than three decades ago. They also want a disqualification of the Vice-Presidential candidate, Shettima, for obtaining two nomination forms simultaneously.

The petitions appear strong in making a case for voiding the Asiwaju Tinubu/Shettima ticket and weak in disputing his victory on the plurality of votes scored at the polls.

The question is: Did Tinubu win the election or not? The answer is obvious: He won. He did better than other candidates in the presidential election, winning in five out of the six geopolitical zones of the country.

Both his runner-up Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and Peter Obi who came a distant third, do not have a legitimate path to victory as none of them got the mandatory 25 per cent in at least two-thirds of the 36 states of the federation. But Tinubu meritoriously satisfied that condition in addition to having majority votes. It is doubtful if any court in the land would declare either of them the winner of the 2023 presidential election for not meeting those prerequisite conditions.

They didn’t meet any of the conditions to satisfy being declared winners. It appears their business at the Tribunal is based on a hopeful disqualification of Tinubu and thereby forcing on the nation another election. Because if Tinubu is disqualified none of them merits being declared the winner of the election.

That Tinubu is not eligible to be declared winner because he did not receive 25 per cent of the votes in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), is a matter to be settled in court. Is the intention of the constitution to confer the privilege of special citizens on the people living and voting in the FCT? That violates the equal rights of all citizens of Nigeria enshrined in the said constitu- tion. Obi’s persistent claim of a ‘stolen mandate’ is, therefore, both spurious and curious. How did he secure the mandate? Where are the validated votes to make such a bogus claim? If the APC allegedly stole his votes, did the PDP also steal his votes?

Dr. Olisa Agbakoba (SAN) recently urged the Court of Appeal to rule piece- meal on the election petitions before it, as a way of calming restive souls; such pos- tulation amounts to shifting the goalposts in the middle of the game. It could also result in a fatal miscarriage of justice if hurriedly done.

Whatever the motive for the suggestion; due processes have to be fol- lowed in accordance with the existing law until amended. Nobody should stampede the judiciary to walk before crawling. Ev- eryone seems to be in a hurry to dispense justice on the petitions but that shouldn’t be to the detriment of any of the parties. All parties should be allowed maximum time to ventilate and argue their positions.

Our jurisprudence will be richer for it.
Kudos to both Tinubu and the APC for their resounding success at the polls against all odds. Preceding the elections were different campaigns of calumny against Asiwaju Tinubu. Most of the polls released orchestrated that Obi would win the elections. They have turned out to be bad polls, perhaps purchased.

But one poll, Fitch Solutions Country Risk and Industry Research as far back as October 2022, predicted Tinubu would win the 2023 presidential election. It added a caveat that the victory would trigger so- cial instability and protests because of his party’s Muslim-Muslim ticket.