Lateef Adegbite
Ahead of the 2023, general elections, the Leadership of the Labour Congress, LC, New Nigerian People’s Party, NNPP, Social Democratic Party, SDP and Peoples’ Redemption Party, PRP, and other several Opposition parties, are said to be holding talks to form a mega party in order to unseat the ruling All Progressive Cngress, APC, and beat the Opposition PDP, in the elections.
The parties may have agreed to take a cue from President Muhammadu Buhari defunct Congress for Progressive Change, CPC, and Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu, a former governor of Lagos state led Alliance For Democracy, AD, Rochas Okorocha, a former governor of Imo state , led faction of All Progressive Grand Alliance , APGA and All Peoples’ Party, APP, including the New People’s Democratic Party, NPDP, to form the APC , IN 2014 , which unseat the ruling PDP, in 2015, to float another mega party.
The Opposition
Parties may have realised that individually, none of them can achieve the success that they are looking at without collaborating. Doyin Okupe, who is standing in as the Vice Presidential Candidate of the Peter Obi, a former governor of Anambra state, and Presidential Candidate of the LC, had said that until ‘’the mergers are in place , the Labour Party cannot say the race has been won.
Appearing on Channels Television recently, Okupe, one time Presidential spokesperson, may have gladdened the heart of Nigerians when he said that ‘’the third force is alive and forming, and in a bid to ensure that every part of the coalition is satisfied , he had to stand in as Labobour Party Vice Presidential Candidate to beat the Independent National Electoral Commission under the close watch of Professor Mahmood Yakubu.
The former President Olusegun Obasanjo spokesperson, had that the Labor Party ‘’putting together the biggest and greatest political coalition in Nigerian history as a ploy to ensure victory at the 2023 polls’’. The Independent National Electoral Commission which had registered 18 political parties may have used the recent Ekiti governorship election to test run the Commission ‘s Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, BVAS, as it plans the 2023, general elections in the country.
Political analysts believe that if he minor parties had collaborated in the Saturday, June 18, 2022, governorhip election in Ekiti state to test their political strength in the state, they would have beaten the ruling APC , in the state. Tis is evident going by theparties performance in the polls. Take for instance, Biodun Onyebanji, the APC, governor, going by the electoral empire result declaration, had polled a total of 87,057 votes, while his closet rivals, Segun Oni, a former governor of the state and Bisi Kolawole, of the SDP, polled 67,457 and N82,211 votes respectively.
Interestingly, Kolawole, the SDP, Candidate, beat Oni, the PDP Candidate to the second position, meaning that if the minor parties in the merger talks and present the SDP Candidate , the coalition would have made their first governorship election victory in Nigeria,
Many believe that without the massive vote buying and selling during the elections by the two dominant parties, APC and PDP, the SDP, Candidate could have won on the first ballot. The Campaign for Equal Voting Access for Persons with Disabilitis, CEVAOWD, a Non-governmental Organistaion, had said that ‘’there was massive vote buying and selling in virtually all the polling centres in the state’’.
The vote vote buying and selling durin the Ekiti governorship election was so pronounced that officials of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, under the close watch of Abdulrasheed Bawa, had some persons alleged to engaged in vote buying in the governorship election. Acting on information, the anti-graft agency was said to have also another residence whre ome persons were caught with a book containing details of voters of certain voting area.
Perhaps, to ensure that this is did not repeat itself in future elections in the country, the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project, SERAP, has asked INEC Leadership to prosecute those caught with money to induce during the Ekiti governorship election as a deterance to others who might want to engage in vote buying in the future elections in the country.
ERAP, had declared hat that that they are suing INEC, to compel the Leadership to prosecute anyone suspected to be responsibl for vote buying and other for forms of Electoral bribery in the Ekiti governorship elections and their spnsors.
Festus Keyamo, a Legal Luminary and minister of State, Labour and Employment, may have shocked Nigerians, when he asserted that ‘reports of vote buying and vote selling during the Ekiti governorship elections was not solely synonymous to the ruling APC , stressing that it caught across all the Opposition Parties in the state’’, all in a bid to see that the ruling APC in the state loses the election.
