Africa’s most populous nation went to the polls December 25 to vote for a new president to replace the current one, General Mohammadu Buhari (rtd), whose second term tenure expires on the 25th May 2023 and therefore was not legible to be on the ballot paper during the election. Prior to this historic event, one of the most volatile issues that has often threatened the nation’s unity and stretched the fabrics that holds it together is that which has everything to do with the conduct of a transparent, free and fare election that would galvanize the confidence of all segments of its citizens. The 2022 Electoral Act Amendment to the nation’s electoral law which the president ovatiously signed into law on 25th February 2022 repealed the Electoral Act No 6 of 2010. It was a bold national electoral reform that is meant to usher Nigeria unto the same threshold of democratic transition best practices with the best crop of its practioners across the world. The on-going elections, preparatory to the forth coming hand over is the first litmus test for the years of inputs that gave birth to the 2022 electoral reform law.
Total votes secured by Tinubu as declared by INEC
On 25th February, the Presidential and National Assembly polls took place. Eighteen presidential aspirants were on the ballot papers. On Wednesday, 29th, Independent National Electoral Commission, made public the final results of the presidential contest. Of the eighteen presidential candidates, four were popular front runners. Two were on the Establishment Horses’ saddles, one on the maverick Talakawa Relevance horseback while the other rode on the Nigerian Resilience colloquially saddle-less horseback. Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, flag bearer of the All Progressive Congress (APC), Alh. Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alh. Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso of the Nigerian National Progressive Party (NNPP) and Mr. Peter Obi of the Labor Party (LP) in that order were the faces on those horsebacks. INEC declared Bola Tinubu winner with a total vote of. 8,794,726 votes, with Atiku Abubakar coming second to him with a total figure of 6,984,520 votes while Mr. Peter Obi came third with 6,101,533 votes. Alh. Kwankwaso polled. 1,496,687 votes to clinch the fourth position.
Alh. Atiku Abubakar of the PDP
While Nigerians from various backgrounds, international election observer groups, Civil Society Organizations and most stridently, the front runner candidates and their supporters have expressed profound reservations about the quantum of sincerity invested in the conduct of the election by officials and the leadership of INEC, with the major losers already knocking on the doors of Election Tribunal/Appeal Courts, a great flood of light needs to be poured on the hand writing the election results has already illuminated on the walls of the Nigerian Project. The strong willed and dispassionate minded Nigerian scenario observer of the past era, juxtaposed with the events of the past few days, during and after the Presidential and National Assembly elections would propound the opinion that just as in deed and in accordance with the law, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu has been declared as winner of the February 25th.election until a competent court of law declares otherwise, the Nigerian nation and its people are the other winners of the election through the TRIUMPH of their RESILIENCE as never before and hardly ever again.
Mr. Peter G. Obi of the Labour Party
That the Nigerian resilience was manifestly re-echoed on the streets and crannies of Lagos, the nation’s metropolitan economic headquarter and Africa’s second biggest economy where AsiwajuTinubu is credited with the god-man image is perhaps a whisper into AsiwajuTinubu’s ears about his own human fallibilities and the Nigerian citizen’s collective superiority before God. The voice of God and the message could not have been otherwise conveyable to AsiwajuTinubu. The two Establishment parties, the PDP and APC, do not just understand the prophetic language that conveys the essence and superiority of the Nigerian resilience. Not with the eloquence of the Bwalas, the dexterity of the tongue of the Alakes, the Keyamos and the out-of-the-world vocabularies of the Fani Kayodes amplified over state-of-the-art media empires like TVC, Arise Television, and “Africa’s largest television network” the NTA. Super-effective media warfare would not provide the listening environment for. Tinubu, nor Atiku, IyochiaAyu, Abdulahi Adamu, El’ Rufai, Olabode George and other Establishment Parties extremists to comprehend the UNCONDITIONALITY of giving ears to the Nigerian Voice as conveyed by their resilience through their votes for Mr. Peter Obi during the presidential and National Assembly elections in the FCT, Delta, Plateau, Lagos, Nasarawa, Kaduna to an extent and Ebonyi States in spite of the disputed figures.
Alh. Rabiu Kwankwaso of NNPP
While AsiwajuTinubu was declared winner of the election by INEC whose duty it is to do so under the watchful eyes of God, the Nigerian Resiliency, amplified into Tinubu’s ears by God for the good of his administration and all Nigerians also won. The Democracy war-baked Asiwaju and unstoppable Nigeria must not ignore the Voice of God. While Asiwaju Tinubu’s laurel was handed over to him on Wednesday 29th February, the Nigerian laurel’s handing over, in the hands of God, is an exercise in perpetual execution undoubtedly through the president elect himself and the 6;101,533 voters who God spoke through, 25th February. May God’s wisdom prevail.
