POLITICS-NIGERIA: Gen Obasanjo’s Party Ahead Of Its Two Rivals

By Toye Olori Reprint | | Print |

Remi Oyo and Toye Olori

LAGOS, Feb 22 1999 (IPS) - Results of Nigeria’s legislative elections, held over the weekend show the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) of former military ruler, Olusegun Obasanjo, ahead of its two rivals.

In the preliminary results announced Monday, the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) got 56, followed by the All People’s Party (APP) 19 and the Alliance for Democracy (AD) 19 in the 109- Senate seats.

PDP also secured 181 seats in the 360-seat House of Representatives, followed by APP, which got 57 and AD 71.

Final results for both houses were still trickling in Monday from the 115,000 polling stations across the vast West African nation of 107 million people.

Up to 40 million people in the oil-rich nation were registered to vote, but witnesses in some of Nigeria’s 36 states said the turnout was as low as 20 percent.

The voter apathy at Saturday’s election was attributed mainly to the absence of a campaign by the candidates, most of whom were hardly known to the voters.

In fact, except for a few posters here and there, door-to- door and open-air campaigns were virtually absent.

The situation was further compounded by the fact that the presidential primaries of the three political parties and the alliance between the AD and APP had all combined to overshadow Saturday’s legislative elections.

“I don’t know any of the candidates since there were no campaigns but I voted for AD. We have been told (by party officials) to vote for AD in the assembly election but for APP- AD alliance in the presidential election next week,” said a Lagos resident who gave her name only as Rose.

Analysts say many voters appear uninterested in casting their votes for fear that the whole electoral process may be aborted as it happened in 1993 when the former head of state General Ibrahim Babangida annulled the results of the country’s presidential polls for “massive use of money”.

This time around, reports of massive use of money abound, compounded by the absence of a Constitution.

Last year General Obasanjo enraged his rivals when he announced a contribution of 1.5 million US Dollars to the PDP campaign.

Amosu Ajibola, a political analyst in Lagos, said in spite of the massive use of money, it was left to voters to decide whether to vote for aspirants, who spent money buying delegates at the primaries, or not.

“It is the turn of voters to shun money politics this time around,” Ajibola said.

He also criticised the absence of constitution ahead of the elections. “Nobody knows how long the people being voted for now will serve. Not even the president who will be elected on Saturday (Feb 27),” Ajibola said. “Persons elected as councillors and chairpersons of local governments, the state assemblies and governors, are yet to be sworn-in.”

A number of voters told IPS on Monday that they expect Saturday’s Presidential elections to draw a larger turnout, perhaps as many as the 40 million registered voters.

The polls, which will be held on Feb 27, will pit General Obasanjo, who ruled Nigeria between 1976 and 1979, against Olu Falae, a former finance minister, who is the presidential candidate for the AD-APP alliance.

Obasanjo’s refusal to attend a live television debate between him and his arch rival Falae, a respected economist, in the capital Abuja this week, has sparked adverse publicity against the former military ruler.

Nigeria’s current military leader General Abdulsalaam Abubakar has pledged to step down on May 29, after handing over power to the first civilian president in 15 years.