My Problems With Atiku And The PDP Over The February 23, 2019 Presidential Election (Part 2), By Ussiju Medaner

My problem with Atiku and the PDP does not find slake in the sense that in their complaint against the election of President Buhari in the just-concluded presidential elections, they are still claiming that ‘The 2nd Respondent submitted to the 1st Respondent an affidavit containing false information of a fundamental nature in aid of his qualification for the said election.’ My problem with this is, how do you submit a false affidavit to contest in an election into an office for which you have earlier submitted same and contested in an election before now, won and even occupy the office for which the election should lead to? This is how baseless their complaint is. How do you disqualify someone from contesting in an election into an office he is already occupying without litigation?

TIMELINE OF INCONCLUSIVE ELECTIONS IN NIGERIA

In 2011 and 2015, the governorship elections in Imo State were declared inconclusive and were concluded with supplementary polls. In the April 26, 2011 governorship election in the state, INEC declared the poll inconclusive because election did not hold in Ohaji/Egbema, Mbatioli, Ngor-Okpala and Oguta local councils as well as in Orji Ward in Owerri North Local Council. Before that election was declared inconclusive, results for 24 of the state’s 27 local government areas had been announced, with Chief Rochas Okorocha of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) leading in 12 local councils with a slim total margin over the then governor, Ikedi Ohakim of the PDP, who also led in 12 local councils but trailed Okorocha in the total votes garnered. After the supplementary polls, Okorocha scored 336,859 votes to beat Ohakim, who scored 290,490 votes.

There was a repeat performance in 2015. In the first election, Okorocha polled 385,671 votes compared to the 306,142 votes scored by Chief Emeka Ihedioha of the PDP. Okorocha led with 79,529 votes while the cancelled votes were 144,715 hence the need for a supplementary election, which Okorocha won.

The Anambra 2013 governorship election was concluded with a re-run after the first election failed to produce a clear winner. In the first results, the APGA candidate, Mr Willie Obiano scored 174,710 votes while Mr Tony Nwoye of the PDP polled 94,356 votes and the APC candidate, Chris Ngige had 92,356 votes. The margin of lead was below the 113,113 votes cancelled, hence a re-run.

In Taraba 2015 governorship election, Darius Ishaku of the PDP had 326, 198 votes in the first election while Hajiya Aisha Alhassan of the APC scored 262, 381 votes. Elections were cancelled in Donga Local Government Area of the state and in six polling units in Takum, and five in other local government areas, from which total votes were more than Ishaku’s marginal lead. Ishaku of the PDP won the elections.

Following the cancellation of 177,000 votes in several polling units in some parts of Osisioma, Ugwunagbo, Aba North, Aba South, Isialangwa South, Isialangwa North, Umuahia North, Umuahia south, Ohafia, Arochukwu and Umunneochi local councils, a re-run governorship poll was ordered in the affected areas. Before the election was declared inconclusive, the PDP candidate, Okezie Ikpeazu had polled 248,549 votes while the APGA candidate, Alex Otti, scored 165,406 making a difference of 83,053. Ikpeazu was the winner after the re-run.

In Kogi State 2015 election, after election results from the 21 local councils were collated, the APC candidate, Abubakar Audu, 240,867 votes, led the incumbent Governor, Captain Idris Wada of the PDP, 199,514 votes. The commission ordered a re-run in some polling units because the 49,953 votes cancelled, were higher than the margin between Audu and Wada. Audu won the re-run elections posthumously.

In 2015 Governor Seriake Dickson of the PDP had to wait for a repeat election in Southern Ijaw Local Council to win re-election in 2015. With results from seven of the eight local councils of Bayelsa, he had 105,748 votes, while Chief Timipre Sylva of the APC got 72,594 votes. The margin of lead was 33,154 votes. However, Southern Ijaw Local Council had 120,827 registered voters, a reason the INEC declared the election inconclusive.

With these precedents in the history of inconclusive elections in Nigeria, it is bewildering to listen to the PDP ranting about inconclusive being a coinage of the APC and INEC. Thus, according to the PDP, this is to rob them of their mandate. How so, and what is the meaning of the nature of elections outlined above majority of which transpired under the PDP administrations.

The worst mistake Atiku and the PDP entirely are making now is putting forth a parallel presidential election result which is sloppy and they did not take time to efficiently doctor it. With all the alleged resources and intelligence at the disposal of Atiku, he should have done more with the result flying around now as the authentic 2019 presidential election result from his camp.

A first time analysis of the result immediately exposes the shallowness of the brains behind the preparation of the results. How did they plan to make Nigeria work if they cannot effectively streamline figures they concocted? How could a group displaying this magnitude of inefficiency, illiteracy,the criminal mindedness and comfort-in-disarray have anything good to offer the nation?

BRIEF ANALYSIS OF INEC AND PDP SERVER RESULTS FROM FOUR STA TES AND THE FCT

Considering four states (Kwara, Gombe, Abia and Lagos) and the FCT with INEC result and the parallel result alleged by the PDP, it is obvious that the PDP only came up with the result as hastily as they could. Comparing both results presented by INEC and the PDP, there is the revelation of the desperation of the PDP to attain power at any cost.

In the FCT, INEC results shows that the total number of registered voters is 1,335,015 while the number of voters accredited on the day of the election is 467,784. From this figure the APC had 152,224 votes while the PDP had 259,423 votes. The number of rejected votes in the FCT stands at 27,457 while the remaining political parties in the contest scored the remaining votes. Contrary to this, the parallel result from the PDP alleges that the number of registered voters within the FCT is 1,344,856 while the number accredited on the day of election is 786,151. The PDP purports that the APC scored 366,427 votes while the PDP scored 419,724 votes. This implies that there were no rejected votes and no other party got any vote.

In Kwara State, the INEC result presents that the total number of registered voters is 1,401,895 while the number of these accredited on the day of the election is 489,482. Of these, the APC scored 308,984 while the PDP scored 138,184 votes. The number of rejected votes is 26,578 while the remaining votes were scored by the other contesting political parties. The purported result of the PDP claims that the individuals who were registered by INEC during registration period is 1,406,457 and of these, the number accredited on the day of election is 732,816. The APC scored 379,643 while the PDP scored 353,173 votes respectively. The PDP ‘server ’ result shows that there are no rejected votes and no other party got any vote.

The INEC result declared for Gombe State reveals that the number of registered voters is 1,385,191 while the number of accredited voters is 604,240. The APC scored 402,961 while the PDP scored 138,482 votes. The number of rejected votes is 26,446 while the remaining votes were scored by the other political parties. But the PDP in the wisdom of their electoral manoeuvrings alleges that there were 1,394,393 registered voters out of which there were 799,302 accredited voters. Their result sheet claims that the APC scored 115,225 votes while they, the PDP magically scored 648,077 votes.

In Abia State INEC result shows that there are 1,793,861 registered voters of which 361,561 were accredited on the election day. Of the figure, APC scored 85,058 votes while PDP scored 219,698 votes. The number of rejected votes was 21,180 while the other contesting parties scored the remaining votes. The fake result from the Atiku/PDP camp alleges that there are 1,932,892 registered voters of which 853,050 were accredited. They claim that APC scored 198,391 votes while PDP scored 664,659 votes. The votes were completely shared between APC and PDP without rejected votes or any other party having any votes.

The last state we shall be considering within this piece is Lagos State where INEC result reveals that there were 6,570,291 registered voters and 1,196,490 voters were accredited on the day of the election. The result after collation shows that APC scored 580,825 votes while PDP scored 448,015 votes. There were 67,023 rejected votes while the other parties scored the remaining votes. The imaginary result from the PDP alleges that there are 6,570,291 registered voters in Lagos State out of which 2,526,203 voters were accredited. It also alleges that APC scored 1,422,906 while the PDP scored 1,103,297 votes. There were no rejected votes in Lagos State and no other party scored any votes in Lagos.

From the states under consideration above, some facts are glaring:

1. Atiku’s server result shows that every other party that participated in the election numbering 71, with the exception of APC and PDP, got no single vote across the nation as all the accredited votes were shared between APC and PDP.
2. Atiku’s result shows that there are no rejected votes in the entire 36 states and the FCT. This is an impossible situation. This is a level we hope to reach with improved voters’ education in the nearest future; but thanks to Atiku who bolted us into the future where we have no rejected votes.
3. In all the states the number of accredited voters was inflated without exception. Whatever they are claiming INEC did was done in all the states.
4. What is the logical explanation for APC reducing its total votes in Lagos state by 842,081 as claimed in the result presented by Atiku when the APC would still have won with a larger margin than the INEC result. What is the logic behind that?

The listed states from the election result as released by Atiku clearly show the intent of the source is to produce figures in favour of their principal without putting other realities under consideration.

Atiku should wake up from his trance off of political hallucination to the reality that he actually lost the election!

To be continued……

God bless the Federal Republic of Nigeria!