Tunisian president wins second term with landslide
In an election that was criticised by rights groups, Tunisia’s President Kais Saied has won a second term with more than 90% of the vote, the electoral commission has said.
Saied’s closest challenger, businessman Ayachi Zammel, won 7% of the vote despite being sentenced to 12 years in prison for falsifying documents – just five days before the poll.
There were no campaign rallies or public debates, and nearly all the campaign posters in the streets were backing the president.
Five political parties had urged people to boycott the elections in the belief that they would not be free or fair.
Tunisia was where a wave of pro-democracy protests in the Arab world began in late 2010, ousting long-time autocrat Zine El Abidine Ben Ali early the following year.
The North African country was seen as a beacon of democracy in the region.
But since Saied, a former law professor, was elected on a wave of optimism in 2019, the 66-year-old has suspended parliament, rewritten the constitution and concentrated power into his hands.
He was widely expected to win a second term after the authorities arrested and jailed dissidents as well as potential rivals.
“According to preliminary results, Saied received 2,438,954 favourable votes,” the country’s Independent High Authority for Elections (ISIE) said on Monday evening.
The third candidate on the ballot, former lawmaker Zouhair Maghzaou, received nearly 2% of the vote.
The final results of the presidential election are set to be announced early next month, according to the electoral agency.
Sunday’s vote was Tunisia’s third presidential election since Ben Ali was overthrown in 2011 following months of massive protests. He had been in power for over two decades before he was forced to flee to Saudi Arabia, where he died in 2019.
Rights group Amnesty International has denounced “a worrying decline in fundamental rights” under Saied’s government as discontent rises over his perceived authoritarian style of governance.
But Saied has rejected the criticism, saying he is fighting a “corrupt elite” and “traitors”.
In a unanimous judgment, a seven-man team of Nigeria’s Supreme Court has thrown out both opposition challenges to President Bola Tinubu’s election win. They are petitions of former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar of the main opposition party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and that of Peter Obi of Labour Party (LP).
However, Justice John Inya Okoro who delivered the lead judgement remarked that the inability of the electoral commission to transmit result to the commission’s I-Rev portal actually reduced the peoples ‘confidence in the electoral process. He however noted that the electoral commission did not err by not transmiting the election result to the I-Rev portal, which was the major contention of the petitioners.
The two main opposition candidates had sought to reverse February’s presidential election, alleging it was marred by irregularities.
The Election Petition Court upheld Mr Tinubu’s victory last month, but the opposition insisted Nigeria’s highest court should quash the judgement.
A presidential election result has never been overturned in Nigeria.
In a unanimous decision, a panel of seven justices first dismissed the challenge by Atiku Abubakar, who came second in the poll, and then rejected a similar one from Peter Obi, who came third.
“It is my view that there is no merit in this appeal and it is hereby dismissed,” said Justice John Inyang Okoro of the case made by Mr Abubakar’s Peoples Democratic Party.
The election was the most fiercely contested since the end of military rule in 1999, with three strong candidates for the first time. Mr Tinubu won with 37% of votes cast, against 29% for Mr Abubakar and 25% for Mr Obi.
With the challenge to his victory finally put to rest, President Tinubu is now expected to focus on how to pull the country out of its current economic crisis.
Nigeria is currently battling a cost-of-living crisis following the removal of a massive fuel subsidy – a situation that has pushed many Nigerians into multi-dimensional poverty.
Opinion: My country is in a fragile place, By Chimamanda Adichie
My country is in a fragile place, By Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
News Update: On Wednesday, Bola Tinubu was declared the winner of Nigeria’s presidential election.
Imagine standing patiently in line, waiting to vote, and suddenly men with guns arrive on motorcycles and start shooting. Imagine men dashing into your polling unit, violently seizing ballot boxes and taking them away. Imagine other ballot boxes being destroyed. Imagine being beaten to keep you from voting for a particular candidate. Imagine a crowd of people chanting “We must vote! We must vote!” when polling workers failed to arrive as expected. Imagine the police doing very little. All these things happened during the Nigerian presidential elections on Saturday. Through it all, there was a chilling lack of transparency from the Independent National Electoral Commission, or I.N.E.C., which oversees elections.
Nigerian elections have a history of being rigged, of cooked-up numbers and stolen ballot boxes. This time, though, Nigerians were asked to place their faith in a new electronic voting system that would make tampering more difficult. Technology would be the savior: In each polling unit, votes would be counted in the presence of voters and then immediately uploaded to a secure central portal. Failing to upload the results in real time was the most egregious of the many irregularities of this election because it has destroyed the cautious trust with which many approached the process.
The I.N.E.C. blames technical issues for the delay. How, Nigerians wonder, can a well-funded electoral body that had four years to prepare for an important presidential election make such a significant blunder? It is reasonable, then, that many voters have assumed purposeful intent, that election workers were instructed not to upload results so that they could later be secretly manipulated.
I know Nigeria, the country of my birth, intimately. I know the political culture, where the exchange of large amounts of money makes so many people conscience-deficient, where the mainstream media’s instinct is political deference and where the will of the people is often ignored. Nigerians, especially young Nigerians, are determined that this time, their votes will matter. A majority of Nigerians are below the age of 35. They are a bright, innovative and talented generation, a hungry generation, starved of good leadership, who do not merely sit back and complain but who act and push back and want to forge their own futures.
On Saturday, many went out to vote, enthusiastic but cautious, their phone cameras ready to record any irregularities. They waited for election workers who arrived many hours late to polling stations. They braved the harassment and beatings of men paid to create chaos. They went off and bought their own ink for finger-printing when election workers claimed to have run out of it. They provided their own light from their phones as they stood in line in the dark, and according to one recorded case, a voter brought a small generator to a polling place when the voting machine stopped working. They refused to leave even though they had to wait so long that it was almost dawn when they could finally vote. And when it began to rain, they came together and sang beautiful songs. I have never been so proud of my fellow Nigerians. Many were voting for the first time, inspired by one candidate, Peter Obi, who has brought to them that ineffable thing that we humans need to thrive: hope.
Now, as results are being counted, there is growing disillusionment. A sludge of tension is in the air. A simmering rage. Some voters say that the official numbers trickling in do not match the numbers from their polling units, that the results tell a story different from what they witnessed on Saturday. They are convinced of the complicity of those who should be caretakers of the democratic process.
Demonstrators accusing the election commission of irregularities and disenfranchising voters marched in downtown Abuja, Nigeria, on Tuesday. Credit…Ben Curtis/Associated Press
Elections must always be transparent, of course, but for an abysmally low-trust society like Nigeria, a radical transparency is needed for credibility. Elections must be completely transparent and must be widely seen to be completely transparent; sadly, neither seems to apply to Nigeria’s presidential election.
African democracies are criticized, often condescendingly so, in ways that stoke resentment, not because the criticism isn’t valid, but because it isn’t fair. Africa is full of young nation-states, and democracy takes time to establish its roots, and even when it does, the fragility always remains.
I’ve always found it curious that African countries were expected to form functioning democracies right after independence, even though the colonial governments they had only just freed themselves from were dictatorships in everything but name. Nigerians want a functioning democracy, and they are starting on the path to it but might be derailed unless the international community pays attention now.
Nigeria is Africa’s tottering giant, the continent’s most populous country, the most politically and culturally dominant. To pay real attention to Nigeria is to signal that Africa matters, as the United States has always maintained. The Biden administration needs to stand behind the Nigerian people now and make a firm commitment to support election transparency. Besides — my tongue is lodged in my cheek — you don’t want a wave of Nigerian asylum seekers fleeing the unbearable discontent of living under an illegitimate government.
Sometimes democracies are threatened by foreign invasions and sometimes democracies are most at risk from internal forces. All of them need support.
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is a novelist and the author, most recently, of “Notes on Grief.”
Nigeria Presidential Election: Nigeria on path to recovery whichever way it goes
Three opportunities—political, social and economic opportunities—are facing Nigeria. Each of the three main contenders to the seat of Nigeria’s presidency come with unique opportunities. Three days to the Presidential election, pundits cannot conveniently predict the way the election will go. But glaring indices point to the fact that whoever emerges the President and commander-in-chief of the most populous African country will do better than the current Muhammadu Buhari led government.
The nearly 8-year administration of President Muhammadu Buhari has been roundly criticised for cluelessness in handling security and economy issues. Buhari’s regime saw regional interests snowball into insecurity especially in the South-East part of the country who felt to have been alienated by the national government. The administration’s tactless approach to security fanned the establishment of regional security networks like the Amotekun in South-West and Eastern Security Network in the South-East. Activities of Boko Haram and bandits also grew in the Northern parts of the country. Although his handlers claimed Buhari’s administration did well in provision of Infrastructure and agriculture, Buhar’s critiques said those efforts were poor and they did not reflect on the economy or wellbeing of the people of Nigeria.
The 2023 election presents three unique individuals: Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the All Progressive Congress, Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party and Peter Obi of the Labour Party.
Tibunu is a south-west politician whose large political foresight has seen him build a political empire from Lagos State where he served as Senator and Governor, then spread to almost every part of the region. Although widely accused of corruption and high-handedness, Tinubu is easily a man of political vision. Over the years, he brought his leadership and management acumen to bear in the development and growth of his political base from an obscure regional party to now a national and ruling party in Nigeria. However, Tibunu has no known source of wealth before he became a political lord in the south-west. Although Tinubu is seen to be battling with health issues, he will surely do better than Buhari if he is voted to be president on Saturday.
Atiku Abubakar, a former Vice President of the country is a politician from the North-West whose made his fortune between 1999 and 2007 when he served as the Vice President to former President Olusegun Obasanjo. Atiku swiftly invested his wealth in education and communication sectors within and outside Nigeria. Atiku is a savvy politician with a huge network of allies across Nigeria. Atiku prides himself as a unifier because of his charismatic style of leadership. Although Atiku is accused of corruption and extravagant life-style, he is likely to perform better than Buhari in terms of handling the economy and security situations of Nigeria.
The third force, Peter Obi, is a wealthy businessman and politician from south-east whose promises of good governance has endeared him to the youth. Obi, who is a trader and producer of consumables promises to bring his experience to bear in turning Nigeria from a consumption nation to a producing nation, thereby pulling many out of poverty. Often described as a frugal politician, Obi built business empires. Obi’s transparent leadership style, good managerial acumen will help him work on the unity and security of the country and also on the economy.
Saturday’s election and perhaps, a run-off election within the next 21 days after Saturday will produce one of these three politicians as the President of Nigeria. Despite the shortcoming of the three leading contenders, any of them who succeeds Buhari will do better than Buhari in unifying the country, working on the economy and security of the country. It is easy to say that Nigeria is on the path to recovery.
Child and duplicate voting are reported in Nigerian elections from 2011
Nigeria: Any Hopes to Address child/duplicate voting ahead 2023 election
The introduction of digital voter register in Nigeria is revealing a lot of irregularities in the system, such as child and duplicate registrations. The legal minimum voting age is 18 and by registering children as well as getting people more than one vote, crooked politicians can inflate their support.
As soon as Nigeria’s first-ever digital electoral register released by Nigeria’s electoral umpire, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) was uploaded on to the internet people began noticing problems.
Amateur digital sleuths uncovered numerous voter cards that appeared to have photos of children on them. Others on the preliminary list seemed to have registered more than once, simply by changing their facial expression, clothes or the way they were sitting.
Questions are now being asked about how these duplicate would-be voters slipped through the expensive fingerprint and facial recognition technology that was recently introduced.
Details such as age, gender, fingerprints and photos were taken at the registration centres of the Independent National Electoral Commission (Inec) with hopes of eliminating such problems.
In next February’s hotly contested general election any discrepancies could be the difference between victory and defeat.
Problems were ‘obvious’
Just by looking at the voter cards it is easy to tell that some of them carry the image of the same person but somehow Inec staff could not pick this up.
“It was so obvious that you don’t need any scientific process to identify the underage voters who registered,” said Sunny Dada from the Institute for Media and Society in Lagos.
A total of 23 Inec officials are now being investigated for their alleged roles in the illegal registrations.
It has not been uncommon in the past for the dead to turn up on the electoral register as deaths are not always officially recorded, but it was the appearance of children and those registering multiple times that caused widespread concerns.
The problems, which have been documented in past elections, have now become glaring with the innovation of a digital register.
In the past, only hard copies of the register were available and as they were posted on the walls of polling units or local council buildings, it was hard to build a national picture.
Only hard copies of the voters’ register were available in the past and had to be inspected at local polling stations
But now, the first digital register allows anyone anywhere to scrutinise the details of a record 93.5 million people – nine million up from last time – who have registered to vote.
Tech-savvy young Nigerians have taken up the challenge and have developed techniques to trawl through the huge data set looking for irregularities.
Journalist Jaafar Jaafar chose a more difficult route, manually inspecting hundreds of thousands of names and faces on the register.
“Any page that had a landscape rather than portrait photo or photos of people laughing raised red flags for me,” he told the BBC.
Some of those who were underage or had registered multiple times had first got on the list as far back as 2011, he said.
Arguably, the transparency of the preliminary digital register is a sign that the process is working as Inec is obliged to respond to objections to names on the list.
The commission said it welcomed the “help” of Nigerians to clean up the register and a corrected list would be released before the 25 February elections.
But when it released the preliminary list in November it said it had already cleaned it up in the three months following the end of the registration period.
Conspiracy theories
Officials said they had spotted and scrubbed 2.7 million incorrect entries, yet underage or duplicate registrations are still being uncovered.
As a result many have been disturbed by the recent discoveries by ordinary citizens and some have unleashed a stream of conspiracies.
In a vast country where people are very sensitive to regional divisions, there have been accusations that Inec has favoured the north, where people have historically voted in large numbers.
Many have pointed out that Inec’s clean-up mostly affected voters in southern Nigeria. For example, in Bayelsa state almost 70% of new registrations were invalidated over discrepancies.
But underage and multiple registrations have been spotted across Nigeria, and many have also been unearthed in the south.
“It is a nationwide phenomenon, there are so many irregularities with the register,” said Mr Jaafar from northern Kano state, adding that part of his motivation was to debunk such conspiracies.
Many, like Mr Dada, are concerned about these issues when the election is just months away, but Inec chairman Mahmood Yakubu has moved to assure Nigerians that no underage voter will cast a ballot.
Nigeria has had many problems with the electoral process in the past and it was thought that the introduction of new electronic technology would make things easier, but there have been challenges.
More than seven million people who filled out the initial online form before the portal closed in July could not go on to complete a physical registration at Inec offices, where there seemed to be a shortage of personnel and machines used to capture voters’ details.
Also, millions of newly registered voters have not received a card that will enable them to vote next year, though Inec has assured the public that they will be ready from mid-December.
The presidential election will also be the first time results from polling units can be viewed in real time and transmitted electronically to Inec headquarters in Abuja, using technology that was highly praised by observers after it was trialled at state elections in Osun, Ekiti and Anambra states.
The Bimodal Voter Accreditation System is an electronic device that authenticates voters on election day using details, such as fingerprints, taken by Inec during registration to ensure that only those who are eligible get to vote.
Many believe it makes elections harder to rig, and despite repeated protestations against its use, especially from the governing APC party, which says it might not work in rural areas where internet connection is poor, Inec has said there is no going back.
But as the preliminary register has shown, technology cannot provide a solution to all the problems associated with credible elections in Nigeria.
“We thought it would solve the challenges of underaged voters and multiple registrations. But as we have seen, technology has its limits especially when you have officials that are willing to be corrupt,” said Mr Dada. DAN ith BBC reports
Nigeria: Spike in demand for Voters Card ahead 2023 election unsettles status quo [/caption]
Nigeria: Spike in demand for PVC ahead 2023 polls unsettles status quo
Nigeria’s electoral umpire, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) said it extended the time-line to end voter registration with additional 60 days after the June 30th deadline. This is the second time the INEC is extending voter registration timeline.
The reasons for the extensions, the INEC said, was massive demand for voters’ card. In Nigeria, eligible voters are denied the right to cast their votes if they don’t possess the Permanent Voters’ Card (PVC).
The new wave of demand for the PVC is connected with the hope that the INEC might implement the use of electronic transmission of votes which would reduce incidences of election manipulation. There is also a spike in political awareness being spread on the social media that there is a possibility of voting out the predominant political parties.
Both the ruling and opposition parties have completed primaries elections and presented their candidates. But the citizens, especially on the social media seem to favour a third force led by an entrepreneur and two-term governor from South-east Nigeria, Peter Obi of a less popular party, the Labour Party. Mr. Obi’s voice of ‘restoring the country to the ordinary people’ seems to be giving hopes to millions of Nigerians, who hitherto never bothered to vote in presidential elections. Hence, the mad rush by people to obtain the PVC and be legible to vote.
There is also a court injunction asking the commission not to stop the registration exercise.
A Federal court Justice, Mobolaji Olajuwon, on recently, granted an order of interim injunction following the hearing of an argument on motion exparte filed by the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project.
SERAP and 185 concerned Nigerians had early this month filed the lawsuit against INEC, asking the court to “declare unconstitutional, illegal and incompatible with international standards the failure of the electoral body to extend the deadline for voter registration to allow eligible Nigerians to exercise their rights.”
In the suit, SERAP had asked the court for “an order restraining INEC, its agents, privies, assigns, or any other person(s) claiming through it from discontinuing the continuous voters’ registration exercise from the June 30, 2022, or any other date pending the hearing and determination of the motion on notice.”
Catholics in Nigeria express worry about Muslim-Muslim ticket
Catholics in Nigeria express worry about Muslim-Muslim ticket
Catholic Secretariat in Nigeria has expressed worry over any intention to fly Muslim-Muslim ticket by any political party. The ruling All Progressive Congress (APC) is prone to flying Muslim-Muslim ticket because its flag-bearer, Bola Ahmed Tinubu is a Muslim from predominantly Christian South, and would need a Northern Muslim to get votes from the Northern region of the country.
In a statement, the Catholic Secretariat in Nigeria said it would have been no source of worry for any political party to pair same religion for Presidential and Vice Presidential ticket but the current situation in Nigeria calls for a great concern. The Statement
We cannot help but once again strongly condemn the atrocious attack and murder of our faithful in Owo inside the Church during Holy Mass on Sunday 5 June 2022, as not just an attack on humanity, but also a terrible slap on the sovereignty of Nigeria and an indictment on the Federal Government. May God grant eternal rest to the departed, comfort those who mourn and heal the wounded. Amen.
The process for the 2023 General election in Nigeria has been initiated and there are some things to be happy about: the passing of the Electoral Act 2022 which allows the use of electronic devices for accreditation and in the capturing and transmission of results; the prompt release of election timetable by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC); the renewed confidence in the electoral process by the electorate, as demonstrated in the massive last minute turn out for voter registration amongst others.
It is however disheartening to observe that the conduct of most of our politicians seem to be going from bad to worse as we witnessed a show of shame and heightened ugly culture of money politics during the recently held primaries.
While all this is going on, we must not lose sight of the fact that the unity of this country has, over the years, been maintained by a delicate balancing of the religious and the regional.
Even in the despotic military era, most juntas ensured a balance of the religious architecture in their regimes. For instance, we had Murtala-Obasanjo, Obasanjo-Yar’adua, Babangida-Ebitu Ukiwe, Abacha – Diya. This also applied to the heads of the various military formations and the different government parastatals like Customs, Immigrations, Finance, etc.
Significantly, it was only during the General Muhammadu Buhari era as military Head of State (Dec 31, 1983 – Aug. 27, 1985) that we had a Muslim-Muslim military dictatorship.
Similarly, only once did we have a Muslim-Muslim ticket in the 1993 democratic elections, which featured Abiola-Kingibe ticket and turned out to be one of Nigeria’s freest and fairest elections. But that government never took off!
Fast forward to 2022, 30 years later, some individuals have tried to suggest the Muslim-Muslim ticket for the Presidential election in a country like Nigeria that has unfortunately been badly polarized.
Ordinarily, there would have been nothing wrong with a Muslim-Muslim or Christian-Christian ticket in a democratic dispensation if there is mutual trust and respect for the human person and where the overriding desire for seeking political office is the fostering of the common good. But one cannot really say so of our country at the moment.
With the present glaring crisis and division in the nation, a Muslim-Muslim ticket would be most insensitive and a tacit endorsement of the negative voices of many non-state actors who have been threatening this nation’s unity and peaceful coexistence without an arrest.
Going by the Kaduna experience, we can perceive the havoc the Muslim-Muslim ticket has brought upon the predominantly Christian people of Southern Kaduna.
We therefore strongly advise those political parties toying with divisive agenda to have a rethink by presenting a more inclusive ticket, while calling on all people of goodwill to resist this budding injustice that may be hatched against a cross section of the people.
In pursuit of peace, it is imperative to remind everyone that all Nigerians, irrespective of creed or region, are equal; as such, there must be sensitivity in the spread of political positions without compromising competence.
Finally, we call on all Nigerians, individually and collectively, to do everything in their power to seek and work for unity and justice, so that we may attain that peace we all desire. There is no alternative to peace!
Claims of fake academic certificates dog Kenya poll race
Claims of fake academic certificates dog Kenya poll race
Several Kenyan politicians running to become governors in August’s general election are facing challenges getting final clearance to vie for the positions as they have allegedly used fake academic degrees.
Kenyan laws require anyone seeking to be elected as a governor or president to hold at least a university degree.
In Machakos county, which neighbours the capital, Nairobi, two voters have sent a complaint to the electoral commission seeking to have Wavinya Ndeti disqualified on allegations that her computer science degree in the UK is fake. She denies the allegations.
In the capital, Johnson Sakaja – an aspirant in the same party as presidential front-runner and Deputy President William Ruto – is also fighting separate attempts by voters to have him disqualified.
Mr Sakaja had initially been cleared by the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) but allegations that a certificate was obtained fraudulently were taken to the commission’s tribunal. He has denied all this.
Kenyans on social media have also been mocking him for allegedly manipulating academic documents to show that he attended a university in Uganda, after a Kenyan university said he had taken a degree course there but had not graduated.
Local newspaper Daily Nation has reported on other aspirants around the country who are facing such challenges with their academic papers.
Nigeria 2023: Worries of Election rigging as Buhari speaks of picking successor
Nigeria 2023: Worries of Election rigging as Buhari speaks of picking successor
In February, 2023, Nigeria, West Africa will once again go to the polls for general election to elect the President, 36 State Governors, and National and sub-national parliamentarians.
The process for the election has begun in earnest with political parties holding primary elections to elect their flag bearers.
But excitement for the election seemed to have waned since Tuesday after President Muhammadu Buhari addressed Governors of the ruling party and spoke about his intention to pick his successor.
Watchers believed Buhari’s choice of words represents his plan for the election—that the presidency would do all it could to subvert free and fair election.
Already, the main opposition political party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has elected a former Vice President and a northern political heavyweight, Atiku Abubakar to fly its flag.
Buhari’s picking successor statement is raising dusts in political circles. A member of the National Working Committee, NWC, of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, has cautioned Buhari on the need to be conscious of his legacies and avoid falling into the temptation of unilaterally picking his successor.
National Vice Chairman, North-West, in the Senator Abdullahi Adamu-led NWC, Salihu Lukman, gave the charge in an open letter to the President Wednesday in Abuja.
Noting that it would be “democratically risky and very costly” to allow the President do so, Lukman urged President Buhari not to copy what he described as the anti-democratic credentials of former President Olusegun Obasanjo who foisted his successor, late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua on his Peoples Democratic Party, PDP and went on to rig the general election to ensure his emergence as President.
Lukman, in the piece titled “Succession and 2023 APC Presidential Candidate: Open Letter to President Muhammadu Buhari,” was reacting to the outcome of Tuesday’s meeting between President Buhari and APC governors.
During the consultative meeting with Progressive Governors on Tuesday, the President had spoken of the internal policies of the APC which allowed ‘first term governors who have served credibly well …to stand for re-election’ and ‘second term governors … accorded the privilege of promoting successors that are capable of driving their visions’.
The President, therefore, solicited for ‘reciprocity and support of Governors and other stakeholders in picking’ his successor, ‘who would fly the flag of our party for election into the office of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in 2023.’
Noting that ordinarily, this should not be a problem as both party members and leaders will always trust the president’s judgment, the APC official however noted that “the big worry is whether loyal party leaders and members should just reduce themselves to being ordinary observers when very sensitive issues with very high potential to diminish and damage Your Excellency’s revered status in the country is being considered”.
The former Director General of the Progressive Governors’ Forum PGF noted that it is important therefore to caution APC to keep faith with basic tenets of democracy as its major campaign message to Nigerians for the 2023 elections.
“This was eloquently highlighted in Your Excellency’s message to our Progressive Governors when you stated that ‘the key to electoral successes is the ability to hold consultations and for members to put the nation above other interests.’
“The temptation for leaders to choose their successors is democratically risky and very costly. If in 2013/2014, Your Excellency could submit yourself to internal democratic processes, it is important that your successor also follows the same process.
“It may also be necessary to highlight that a major disadvantage with succession arrangement whereby Governors chose their successors is that it negatively affects relationship between the successor and the predecessor, which undermines capacity to influence actions or inactions of successors by their predecessors.
“Your Excellency, since the period of negotiating the merger that produce our party APC, I have been a proponent of ensuring that our party takes every step to preserve our leaders who could exercise moral authority.
“This means that leaders who are highly respected on account of their standing in society should not hold elective or appointive positions.”
Nigeria: Spike in demand for Voters Card ahead 2023 election unsettles status quo [/caption]
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