In 1983, Chief Sam Mbakwe, incumbent governor of Imo State, was declared winner of the governorship election in the State that year. Did he really win the election? Perhaps he did but it was rather absurd that it was Mbakwe himself who was the first to formally declare his own victory through the broadcasting outfit of his State.
At the time of his broadcast, the electoral body – the Federal Electoral Commission (FEDECO) was yet to announce the result because it had not completed the collation of votes cast at the election. To suggest that Mbakwe’s victory was suspect may make some sense but it would be a simplistic statement because Mbakwe just didn’t want to be taken by surprise by political swindlers within the electoral body.
Mbakwe’s wisdom would make sense when it is realized that in Ondo State, victory at the governorship election was swapped. Chief Adekunle Ajasin, incumbent governor of the State who was generally believed to have won the election was formally declared by FEDECO to have lost to his opponent Chief Akin Omoboriowo. The latter would probably have served his term as governor if our Judiciary of the time was as sophisticated as the one of today.
These days, we have ample cases of technical justice where a person who was not allowed to contest a particular election can also be declared the winner of the same election. The victory in the governorship election in Rivers State in 2007 is no doubt a good example.
According to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Celestine Omehia who contested the governorship election under the banner of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) won the contest. On the other hand, the Nigerian Judiciary having found that Rotimi Amaechi was the rightful candidate of the party declared him the winner.
That was how the election was won. The judgment made some sense to some people but the layman may have found it hard to understand the logic which tended to suggest that persons who voted for Omehia thought it was Amaechi they voted for. The point to be made is that anyone who does not understand the Nigerian Judiciary is not likely to comprehend how some of our governors win their elections.
It would, for instance, be difficult for today’s political analysts to appreciate the reported victory of Aliyu Wammako, the PDP candidate in the 2007 governorship election in Sokoto State. It is only posterity that will probably get to know what the election stood for when the basis of the conflict between Justice Ayo Salami, the President of the Court of Appeal at the time and Justice Katsina -Alu, the then Chief Justice of Nigeria(CJN) is revealed.
Similarly, the victory of Admiral Murtala Nyako, incumbent governor of Adamawa State in the 2012 governorship election in the State is for scholars a researchable topic. Section 285 of the Nigerian Constitution provides that an appeal from a decision of an election tribunal must be heard and disposed off within 60 days from the date of the judgment of the tribunal.
In the Adamawa case, the Court of Appeal went into hiding for 58 out of the 60 days until the CJN forced it to make a pronouncement just before it became legally too late to so act. Without been uncharitable therefore, one can argue that Nigeria has developed a political culture in which a governorship election in the country can hardly produce a clear winner.
There are however reports that a few candidates do really win their elections. It is only to be hoped that such candidates are not part of those who won elections with huge votes whereas the same elections recorded low turnout of voters. During the Bayelsa governorship election of 2012, the media were unanimous that the event was characterized by voters’ apathy. Yet, official results showed that many places recorded as high as 90% turn-out.
Interestingly, election observers unanimously expressed serious reservations over the authenticity of the INEC figure. The aspersions which, independent observers cast on figures released by the umpire, did not make less impact than the situation in 1999, when the former American President, Jimmy Carter at the head of an international observer group, was quoted to have said that there were several cases of “disparity between the number of voters observed at the polling stations and the final result”
The July 2012 governorship election in Edo State where Governor Oshiomhole was reported to have overwhelmingly defeated his opponents would have been praise worthy. Unfortunately, the election carried a snag in the sense that the winner of the election openly discredited the umpire while the voting process was in progress.
If the winner of an election had no faith in the umpire, could it be that he won a bad election? Put differently, what was actually bad- the election process, the voters, the candidates, the winner or the referee? These are questions that are hard to answer in a Nigerian election especially when it involves governors.
Anyone who wants to understand the disposition of a typical Nigerian governor to elections has to read all that has been made public about the recently held election by the Nigerian Governors’ Forum to select a Chairman.
The election which was held on Friday May 24, 2013 had only 35 voters. According to reports, Governor Rotimi Amaechi won the contest through the ballot box while Governor Jonah Jang was reported have also won but through signatories to an agreement.
Those who signed the document and failed to follow it during voting appear to teach a lesson that agreement notwithstanding, every person should always vote according to his conscience at the appropriate time. Some governors said filling the post through an election was unusual and as such the person they voted for did not win.
Some said they were trapped while others said they were coerced meaning that someone was able to stop political thugs from the venue. It was thus an election which featured the politics of equality as each candidate had both security vote and security personnel. It was a good election which has established that a typical Nigerian governor does not win an election.
-vanguard
February 10, 2013, 11:23:12 AM