Anambras Jega-jaga Election 27 Nov 2013 Obi Ogadi thinks that the outcome of the Anambra election bears the stigma of incompetence that the leadership of the Independent National Electoral Commission can neither defend nor run away from One of the gifts that God has blessed me with is not the gift of prophesy, at least, not in the sense of the Pentecostal and white-garment churches; not in the sense of running commentaries on an unshown video of future events that can come to pass. But by talent and training, I make observations and pay attention to their implications in great detail, noticing what many do not see. I also try to keep my God-given long memory where many will conveniently lose theirs. These two help me to point to future events with some level of accuracy. About six months ago I wrote a piece ‘Before the PDP fields three candidates’. Before choosing that caption and filling in the content, I did not have any vision or dream guiding me to the number. I did not envisage he dramatis personae in the macabre drama that eventually characterised the build-up and the aftermath to the nominations in PDP, and their eventual participation in the discredited elections. I simply considered that since 2003 when the PDP’s inglorious infighting in Anambra State led to the departure of the soul of the party to co-found Action Congress (AC), later, Action Congress of Nigeria when they merged with Democratic Peoples Party (DPP) and now part of a further merger, All Progressive Congress (APC), PDP has never gone into any election in Anambra State, no matter how small without producing at least two candidates on the same ticket from crisis. However, in the 2011 senatorial election, they did the unthinkable. The process of nomination threw up three persons laying claim to the same ticket and the battle went on for 18 months before the party chose one Margarie Okadigbo, who though being a spouse to the legendary Oyi of Oyi, Dr Chuba Okadigbo, did not in reality present herself for election in the field. I studied the scenario that produced this triple-battle with over nine cases and asked myself whether those inherent issues had been resolved. No was the answer in my mind, hence the caption. Similarly, in an article shortly afterwards, authored as a rejoinder to Law Mefor’s piece on July 29 edition of Daily Independent, I espoused that INEC was not yet ready to learn from the errors that produced all past flawed results in Anambra State till date. If you ask me, Anambra has never been lucky with elections, but basically, elections were supposed to be improving generally in the country and I thought I should lend my reasoning to other steps that if INEC took, we would have free and fair elections in Anambra State. Little did I realise that I was talking to myself and innocent members of the Anambra State voting public who did not possess the powers to do something about the step I was putting forward. Little also did I know that these innocents will turn out to be victims of the machinations of an umpire. Now that I may have wasted my loud thoughts because I now have enough facts to conclude that in the elections of November 16, 2003- that important date when one of the foremost sons of Anambra State in history, Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe was born and buried- rather than improve, we lost the gains of 2011 and returned to 2007. What a pity! The only difference between last Saturday in Anambra State and April 21, 2007 is that while people were waiting to have election materials delivered around 4.30pm, 2.00pm and 1.30 pm in respective areas of the state, results were not being announced on radio. The difference is that their favourite candidate was not suddenly pulled out of the ballot papers a few days to elections, leaving the people angry. But in all other ramifications, 2013 and 2007 elections were similar- in the plot, execution, aftermath, brazenness and insensitivity that followed. Two thousand and seven meant that a candidate was anointed by President Olusegun Obasanjo, who had no history of winning elections and INEC had instructions to deliver him. The same plot was executed on Saturday. A pact was carefully packaged between President Goodluck Jonathan and Governor Peter Obi who was allegedly handed over the security apparatus from the highest level. How can anybody think that INEC would not follow the simple laws of elections as stated in the 2010 Electoral Act as amended? Were materials not supposed to be in the polling booths to allow accreditation being by 8.00am? Was there not supposed to be results sheets to enter the total number of accredited persons at 12.00 Noon? Was there not supposed to be ballot papers at 12.30 to enable voters who had been accredited vote? Were materials supposed to have arrived in some locations and the Presiding Officer given the discretion to order simultaneous accreditation and voting? And pray, has it ever been heard that electoral officers went on strike and on Election Day? Now, if all these are happening and the voters’ register is also discovered to be inconsistent with the ones people had to check their names before then, something is terribly wrong. In places like Awka, 300 persons gathered in on polling booth and failed to find their names in the register, which is manipulated to accommodate about 30 members of the voting crowd which cannot be identified by those who are conversant with the booth. Automatically, you find that there is high voter turnout in terms of the number of human beings that appear, but a low declaration of the figures. In many locations, the result sheets were not available. The double barrel nature of result sheets not being available is that when they are not in the polling booths, they are elsewhere. They care in homes. They are in centres of thumb-printing. They are in places where illegal results are being written, and with illegality, there are no boundaries. There are those who would like to argue that if results sheets are missing in Idemili North Local Government Area (LGA), then that single LGA should be isolated. I beg to differ, because missing result sheets from one LGA can find their ways to other LGAs where they suddenly become useful in swapping genuine results of other locations. Like a virus, once it is in, it is on. Once it finds an abode in its victim, it begins to ravage the system and there are no clear boundaries. There is strong enough reason to believe that the Anambra State gubernatorial election of November 16 has been compromised in planning and execution and what is now on the horizon as error is to my mind, a deliberate action to pre-determine election results. This is all that everyone prayed for in Anambra. Everyone who wishes the state well, understanding the power of legitimate governance in the conduct of the affairs of the state looked forward to an improvement on the performance of INEC in Edo State. They looked forward to an election with a transparent process. They looked forward to an election that will bring joy to the footsteps of the long-suffering people of the state. They were disappointed. I am equally disappointed. The observers were disappointed. The only persons who are not disappointed today are those who appear to be favoured by the brazen allocation of figures in the mockery the election that Saturday turned out to be. Understandable as that is, what this system needs a sustainable clean process for elections that is not a respecter of anybody. And this assumes a new importance when we consider that a compromised process may not favour one person always, but Anambra State affairs needs to be run by a government that enjoys popularity and legitimacy. Many have tried to place blames at many doorsteps. Some have fingered Governor Peter Obi, who they said was more involved in the processes of the election than he should be. Others fingered President Jonathan who apart from being a close friend and ally of Obi has sacrificed his party’s candidate to go into a pact with APGA, all tailored towards the 2015 presidential election, thereby running to deliver pre-determined results. Others blamed Prof Attahiru Jega, who has been entrusted with the responsibility of heading the election organising body. If there must be any blames at all, I go for Jega’s jugular because there is a lot he could have done to ensure a good election in Anambra State, which he failed to do. He is vicariously liable. He has not done all that he should do. He ought to have been on the ground in Anambra State to take certain decisions. If he must be away, there ought to have been one official to make those decisions on his toes. And again why was the voters’ register not displayed by INEC itself as the law states, rather than the closet approach of giving electronic copies to individual parties, only to change it three days to the elections, based on whatever excuses. Anambra’s elections as so far conducted will neither produce peace, order and good governance, not enhance the confidence of the state in governance as it were. It does not hold the prospect even to favour those who are emphasising the 2015 calculations, because the reflection on the ground everywhere in Anambra State is anger against the system that has not allowed the voting public in the state to choose their leaders freely, and fairly in an acceptable election. This election is Jega-Jaga and Attahiru Jega whose hasty attempt at cosmetic repair led him to fix elections in Obosi when people where in church and ended up deploying materials to other towns like Nkpor an Umuoji unannounced must take full responsibility. To get out of the credibility trap that Jega has allowed himself to walk into and to be able to rediscover his personal reputation and that of the organisation over which he presides, he must, along with his team find the will to cancel the whole election, which has no declared winner yet; cancel the mess and begin a new process with new Resident Electoral Commissioner; new National Commissioners and with him being in charge. He once did that when results sheets did not arrive early for the National Assembly Elections in April 2011. Anything short of that is to return Anambra State to the precipice and the nation may just share in the migraine because it is a foretaste of the general election in 2015.
Posted on: Sun, 01 Dec 2013 12:50:15 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015