ABDULRAHMAN ZAKARIYAU takes a look at how the re-run battles were fought in Benue, Plateau, Kano, Sokoto and Adamawa states between the All Progressives Congress and Peoples Democratic Party.
The 2019 general elections have been won and lost, but the intrigues, suspense and victory of the gubernatorial re-run elections held March 23, 2019 will for sometime remain subject of controversy. Reason being that the decision by the Independent National Electoral Commission to order re-runs in the five states of Benue, Plateau, Kano, Sokoto and Adamawa is fast becoming a legal issue and subject of discourse in both the political and academic circles..
Benue all for Ortom
Expectedly, Governor David Ortom of Benue state, a former All Progressives Congress (APC) member up until 2018, was last Saturday re-elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Before the re-run polls, Ortom had polled 410,576 votes as against 329,022 votes secured by Emmanuel Jime, the All Progressives Congress candidate . The margin of lead at the time was 81,554 votes
After the re-run polls, at final count, as announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) returning officer for the state, Professor Sebastain Maimako, Ortom polled 434,473 votes to defeat Jime and the APC who secured 345,155 votes. He was declared winner of the election with a wide margin of 89,318 votes.
Prior to the re-run, many political observers had concluded that, the factor of unpaid salaries in a state with an estimated 60 per cent civil servants of the entire population might work against Ortom. They also predicted that without the support of the federal government and the godfather of Benue politics, former governor George Akume, it would be herculean for Ortom to return as the state’s helmsman.
Surprisingly, against all odds, like a war general who understands the use of foot soldiers, Ortom deployed state apparatuses and his political appointees across the state. With the speed of light, APC and its candidate were subtly painted “killers” and sponsor of Fulani herdsmen, Akume was also blackmailed as the godfather who prevented Ortom from paying salary. All that were supposed to be used against him turned the other way and used by Ortom’s foot soldiers against Jime, his main challenger.
Explaining how Ortom won, a political analyst and public affairs commentator, Jide Ojo said he won because he played victim.
He said, “In Benue state, Governor Samuel Ortom won sympathy votes. He played a victim and got people behind him. His campaign was if you don’t vote for me, these Hausa Fulani people who are sponsoring these Fulani herders will take over your land. So, even though his not paying salaries, doing any developmental projects he was able to rally people to see him as their saviour. Also, APC in Benue was in crisis, the indicator was there when the former governor of the Benue, who incidentally is the harrow head of APC, George Akume lost his Senatorial seat.”
How Useni, PDP lost Plateau
In Plateau state, the PDP governorship candidate, Senator Jeremiah T. Useni lost to the incumbent governor and candidate of the APC, Simon Bako Lalong in a keenly contested elections. Cumulatively, with the result collated from the inconclusive election of 9th March, 2019 and the result of the re-run, Lalong was declared winner by INEC’s state returning officer, Prof Richard Kimbir, after scoring 595,582 votes to defeat 23 other candidates, including the PDP standard bearer, who garnered 546,813. Lalong won with 48,769 votes.
Political pundits believe Lalong benefited from the internal crisis within the state PDP. The row was a fallout of the party’s primary which produced Useni amidst controversy. The inability of the party to manage the internal wrangling, the age factor of its candidate and his choice of running mate all combined to give victory to Lalong.
Supporting this argument, a Jos-based legal practitioner, Gyang Zi says the party should be blamed for “shooting itself down” even before the election commenced.
“I think, from all indications, the claim by the PDP of having been robbed of the Plateau governorship should not apply, given the crisis in the party in the build-up to the elections. Rather, the party should blame itself for the loss, even though it has a better chance of winning the elections. It actually destroyed itself from the outset.
“Apart from the crisis arising from emergence of the party’s governorship candidate and his running mate, which was not properly managed, the PDP leadership became extremely insensitive and arrogant before the elections. While people were still struggling to get over the choice of the governorship candidate, the party leadership imposed a very unpopular personality on them as deputy, as a very controversial circumstance bluffing all dissenting voices.”
The Kano debacle
In another historical election, the people of Kano state re-elected Governor Abdullahi Umar Ganduje for another 4 years. Surprisingly, like a parade ground where at the shout of about turn, the first becomes the last and the last become the first, PDP candidate, Abba Yusuf who at the inconclusive election results was leading with over 20,000 votes, was defeated by the incumbent with 8,000 votes. Put together, the total figures for APC stood at 1,033,695 votes against 1,024,713 votes secured by PDP. By this outcome, Ganduje won with a margin of 8,982 votes.
Interestingly, few political observers had written Ganduje off on account of the alleged kickback scandal published by an online medium. Of course, the governor severally denied thus making him innocent in the court of public opinion. Some were even of the view that Ganduje would not coast home to victory without the support of his estranged godfather and leader of the Kwakwasiyyah Movement, Senator Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso who had since dumped the APC and pitched tent with the PDP. The rest is now history.
Though it’s alleged there were cases of voter intimidation, harassment and inducement during the re-run election, Ganduje’s victory, many posit, was merited.
Political observers further argue Ganduje has done well in the last four years in terms of construction of roads, hospitals and other infrastructural facilities, youths and women empowerments, women inclusiveness in government and some other aspects.
“Aside all these, Ganduje won this election because he was obviously better than the PDP candidate, Abba Yusuf who was imposed on the party and being teleguided by his in-law and former governor, Kwankwaso,” a political commentator says under anonymity.
342 as Sokoto decider
]The victory of former Speaker House of Representatives Aminu Waziri Tambuwal in the re-run gubernatorial election in Sokoto is similar to that of his Benue counterpart. However, in Tambuwal’s case, it was a slim victory of 342 votes as decider.
Announcing the result, the state’s INEC returning officer, Fatima Mukhtar, the PDP candidate scored the highest number of votes after the summation of results from both the March 9 first ballot and supplementary election.
In the re-run election, Tambuwal polled 24,444 votes and scored 489,558 votes in the inconclusive first ballot, bringing his total to 512,002. His main opponent, Ahmad Aliyu of the APC polled a total of 511,660 votes, being the sum of 486,145 and 25,515 in the first ballot and re-run election respectively. So, he narrowly defeated his former deputy with 342 votes.
Like Ortom, Tambuwal also dumped APC for PDP sometimes in 2018. Also, he won without the support of the godfather of Sokoto politics, Aliyu Magatakarda Wamakko and without support from the federal government. Therefore, pundits are of the opinion that Tambuwal won because of his ability to mobilise his foot soldiers; that is all his appointees. The power of incumbency at state level was also a factor that perhaps swayed votes in favour of the former speaker.
‘Every vote counted’
Reacting to the margin of victory, a resident of Sokoto, Aminu Muhammadin, in a phone chat with Blueprint Weekend says the slim victory shows every vote counts and all voters are important.
“Tambuwal won because of his ability to effectively use the power of incumbency and as a result of some of his projects and programmes that were equally situated across the state. With the margin of 342 votes, obviously, the peoples’ votes count.”
Intra-party crisis as Bindow’s albatross
In the far North-east, Adamawa state, home state of the PDP presidential candidate in the 2019 general elections, Atiku Abubakar, the first and second ballot was full of drama. After the first ballot, the opposition candidate, Ahmed Umar Fintiri, led with 32,476, having polled 367,471 votes as against his closest rival and incumbent governor, Senator Muhammed Jibirila Bindow of teh APC who polled 334,995.
And suddenly, the Movement for Restoration and Defence of Democracy (MRDD) and its supposed candidate, Eric Theman, asked the court to cancel the election on the grounds that the party’s logo was not on the ballot paper. Consequently, Justice Abdul-azeez Waziri of the state high court in Yola ordered an indefinite postponement of the governorship re-run polls.
This was a great setback for almost everyone who was concerned about Adamawa state. Interestingly, on Tuesday, Justice Waziri vacated his own order, saying: “Election is a constitutional matter; this court would not be used to breach the process.” As a result of this, INEC fixed Thursday for re-run election.
The returning officer for the election, Prof. Andrew Haruna, declared the result on Friday morning in Yola after the supplementary election in 44 polling units across 14 local government areas of the state. Haruna said Fintiri polled 376,552 votes to defeat Bindow who got 336,386 votes.
It is believed Governor Bindow lost his re-election bid to serious infighting and politicking within the state APC. As much as he tried to reconcile with some stakeholders after the controversial primaries of the party, such effort did not yield the desired result as the party went into the contest a divided house. Some also claim the “neutral” role played by Bindow in the presidential election contributed to his failure. But the governor has since denied this.
Re-run reflects will of the people – Ojo
Analysing how these states were won and lost, a political analyst and public affairs commentator, Mr Ojo, says all votes counted and the re-run results reflected the will of the people.
He says, “The rerun elections were children of necessity. In as much as the political class always breach the rules of the game, you cannot but have a supplementary elections, because the election will be declared inconclusive.
“But my take is that, if you look at Kano, Sokoto, Benue, Adamawa and Plateau states, the elections were very competitive in these states. That was why the cancelation led to supplementary elections. Assuming the margin of the leading candidate was huge as it was in the past, where elections was just a mere routine, where all manner of shenanigans happened, where you had landslide and moon slide victory no matter the level of cancelation, the commission will not go and have supplementary election.”
“So it is the fact that our election is becoming highly competitive that we have this number of inconclusive elections and of course necessitating supplementary elections. If there is no violence and breach of electoral procedures, there will be no need for these inconclusive elections. Because the rationale that led to these supplementary elections were breach of electoral procedures, over voting, non use of smart card reader and violence.
“During these supplementary elections, there were moves by some political groups to reach out to the President. You also recall that there was a press statement from the Presidency, that the president was not going to interfere in the supplementary elections in these states. If the president had interfered, it would have been widespread victory for his party in all these states.
“So, it was because the president refused to be involved and allowed the free will of the people, that is why you see the level of competitiveness that you have seen and the freest, fairest of the process.”
Jide who condemns what led to the rerun maintains that, “We are not where we are supposed to be, violence should not have a place in our electoral process. So, if you have to orchestrate violence in other to give the electoral management the chance to cancel results, believing that when there is supplementary election you can use state resources to influence victory to your side, with these elections, you can see that it doesn’t work any longer like that. After all, Jibrilla Bindow, the incumbent governor of Adamawa lost, M. E Abubakar, also an incumbent governor in Bauchi lost. Largely, these show that our electoral process is getting better with time.”
On how Kano was won and lost, Ojo believes “the internal fighting in PDP contributed to Ganduje’s victory in the re-run election. You know even ahead of March 9th governorship election, a high court said that Abba Yusuf is not the authentic candidate of PDP and that there was no party primary and that there should a party primary before the election.
“It was one of the aspirants that took Abba Yusuf to court, and from what we learnt Abba Yusuf was also more or less an in-law to Kwankwaso. So you can see that it was a house divided against itself, Kwankwaso pressured all other candidates, suppressed them to have his supposed in-law as the candidate. So that created bad blood and also aided Ganduje’s return.
“In Sokoto state, it’s clear indication that our votes are counting. I am sure in the electoral history of Nigeria, maybe at councillorship and chairmanship, but for governorship, the margin has never been as close as it was in Sokoto state. For a governorship candidate to emerge with 342 votes, less than 500 votes, shows that vote of the people and the outcome of this 2019 elections largely reflected the will of the people.
“The bottom line is that this 2019 largely reflected the will of the people. That means our vote is counting and how people voted shows that even in the same election people can decide to vote you out if you are not performing, if your thought and ideals are not resonating with that of the people, irrespective of inducement, when people say your time is up, it is up.”
