The All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate Muhammadu Buhari has been re-elected as president for another four-year term after facing down stiff competition from his closest challenger Atiku Abubakar of the People’s Democratic Party, (PDP). In the final tally announced by the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof Mahmood Yakubu, Buhari polled 15, 191, 847 votes while Atiku, a former vice president between 1999 and 2007, got 11, 262, 978 votes.
Buhari was declared the winner of the election on Wednesday morning, more than three days after voting closed in most of the polling centres. Atiku, a former ally of President Buhari, led a motley pack of challengers, most of whom posed no serious obstacle to Buhari’s re-election. Observers said violence, killings, malpractices and attacks on electoral officials marred the elections which held a week after it was earlier scheduled.
According to figures released by INEC, the majority of Buhari’s votes came from the North where he has a cult following. Both Buhari and Atiku are from the north; and analysts had predicted before the elections that being northern Muslims, the two front runners will share the votes from the region. The results proclaimed by INEC showed that Buhari also won in four out of six states in Southwest, a traditional stronghold of the APC, and four states in the country’s north-central which many believed will swing towards the opposition.
But the PDP rejected the results of the elections even before Buhari was declared the winner, accusing INEC of colluding with the ruling APC to rig the election. PDP’s national chair Uche Secondus claimed on Sunday that Atiku was in the lead based on the results collated by its agents across the country. The same case was made by the PDP agent at the national collation center, Osita Chidoka.
“All results currently being announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) is incorrect, thus unacceptable to our party and people,” Secondus told a press conference hours after INEC started the official collation of the results.
“As results trickled in on Sunday, February 24th, 2019, clearly putting the PDP in the lead, the ruling party and President Buhari dispatched high-ranking officials to coercively influence outcomes in different geopolitical zones in the country.” The PDP is contesting APC’s victory in four northern states and demanded that fresh elections be held in those states.
“We demand the immediate and outright cancellation of Presidential election results in Yobe, Zamfara, Nasarawa and Borno states as submitted by INEC presiding officers and ask for the conduct of fresh elections in these states,” PDP’s deputy director general of Presidential Campaign Organization Tanimu Turaki said in a statement.
Tanimu’s statement gave an insight into the complaint of PDP chairman, Secondus. Here is the full text:
“The PDP predicates its demand on available evidence to the effect that data from the card readers are being reconfigured to suit the manipulations, rigging and over-voting already carried out during the election in some states by the All Progressives Congress (APC). Already the PDP National Chairman, Prince Uche Secondus has communicated this position of our party to the INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu.
We have evidence from the smart card reader accreditation data that what is being announced by INEC has been seriously tampered with and manipulated. In the meantime, we demand the immediate and outright cancellation of Presidential election results in Yobe, Zamfara, Nasarawa and Borno states as submitted by INEC presiding officers and ask for the conduct of fresh elections in these states.
In Yobe, the total number of votes submitted as cast was more than the number of accredited voters. Whereas the number of accredited voters was 601, 056, the total votes cast was 775, 449. This is a clear case of over-voting which, by the provisions of the Electoral Act, renders the election null and void. In such instance, the law provides for another election on a day to be fixed by INEC.
In Zamfara state, no actual voting took place and there was no single result sheet in any polling unit in the entire state. There was an arrest in Shinkafi Local Government, where an APC member was caught thump-printing ballot papers inside his house. Results from the presiding officer from Zamfara were concocted and allocated according to the wishes of the leadership of the APC and INEC. The PDP therefore demands the outright deletion of the results from Zamfara from INEC records and a conduct of free, fair and credible Presidential election in Zamfara state.
Also in Borno state, there was no election but a figure writing exercise and allocation of results according to the whims and caprices of the APC leaders. We also demand the outright deletion of the results from Borno from INEC records and a conduct of free, fair and credible Presidential election in Borno state.
In Nasarawa, the PDP demands the immediate restoration of our over 157, 000 lawful and valid votes which were unlawfully and arbitrarily cancelled by INEC and the announcement of the actual results from the field.
Similarly, the PDP demands an immediate restoration of our over 79, 000 valid votes which were unlawfully cancelled by INEC in Kogi state and the announcement of the authentic results inclusive of the restored 79,000 votes. In the FCT, the PDP demands the restoration of 27,000 valid votes unlawfully and arbitrarily cancelled by INEC and a declaration of the authentic result, inclusive of our restored 27,000 votes.
In Plateau, the PDP demands the immediate restoration of our over 30,000 lawful and valid votes, which were unlawfully cancelled particularly in Jos North and the declaration of the genuine results as delivered at the polling units inclusive of our 30,000 restored votes.
The PDP therefore calls on Nigerians to disregard the results until INEC provides the data from the smart card reader accreditation at the polling units; conducts fresh election in Borno, Yobe and Zamfara states as well as restore our votes in Plateau, FCT, Kogi and Nasarawa states. The PDP maintains that from the actual votes delivered at the polling units, which we all have, Nigerians clearly and unequivocally gave their mandate to Atiku Abubakar.”
The PDP was contradicted by Festus Keyamo, the campaign spokesman of the APC, who said the national collation center was not the appropriate forum for the complaint. The INEC chairman on his part, advised the PDP to submit their letter at the INEC office in Abuja.
Controversies and malpractices
The elections were characterized by killings and outright violent attacks against electoral officials at different locations in the country. A few returning officers told INEC chief at the National Collation Centre on Tuesday that some officials were attacked. The Cross River State resident electoral commissioner told The Guardian on Sunday that 18 members of the National Youth Service Corps who served as ad-hoc workers during the election were kidnapped. 14 of them, he said, were released afterwards. The police in the state said it was not aware of the kidnappings.
In Lagos, polling units were attacked by political thugs in areas where they believed would jeopardize the chances of their supported parties. Ballot boxes and papers were either destroyed or dubiously thumb-printed in some instances. More than a dozen people were killed in violent clashed in oil-rich Rivers State where APC contested only in the presidential election.
The Situation Room, an umbrella group of more than 70 civil society organizations, said at least 39 persons were killed during the Saturday polls. “Situation Room reiterates that no election in Nigeria should cost the life of any citizen and condemns in the strongest terms the lack of empathy, concern and sensitivity by the police class regarding these events,” it said in a statement. 16 persons were suspected killed in Rivers, four in Bayelsa and two in Delta state. There were also confirmed fatalities in Kogi and Oyo State.
Cancellations
The executive director of the Policy and Legal Advocacy Centre and convener of the Situation Room, Clement Nwankwo said the way votes were cancelled in polling units across the country lacked transparency. “There is a lack of clarity in the rationale for cancellation of polls,” Nwankwo said on Tuesday. “We have recorded 1,084,358 cancelled votes across 1,175 polling units in 18 States; the pattern of this cancellation requires some close interrogation to show fairness and objectivity.”
Regardless, it is obvious that the battle for the 2019 presidency will now shift to the election tribunals and might go all the way to the Supreme Court.
