The context of elections in Nigeria has not only been sanguinary, it has, almost always, been mired in controversy and negativity. From the nation’s first and second republics, which one could regard as periods of learning to its more recent and somewhat matured experimentation with democracy, all, contextually, reinforce the notion that elections in Nigeria are less of fair contests and more of political gang-wars, where playing fair could cost you more than you can ever imagine.

Each of Nigeria’s past republics as if taking a cue from the one preceding it, has repeatedly created the same background of divisiveness, violence, rigging, election manipulations and ballot box snatching with only slight improvements at every electoral cycle. Every cycle, to be sure, has brought with it marginal improvements that are beclouded by newly formulated methods of cheating and subverting the system. Today, we have, in addition to and clearly distinct from the earlier mentioned anomalies, voter suppression and vote buying, which operate using sophisticated human mechanics and rank as the worst drawbacks militating against Nigeria’s democracy.

The electoral context described above has made it relatively easier for any political party with the greatest acumen for unleashing organized violence to gain political power in Nigeria. It has also rendered political assasinations and electoral violence so commonplace that the morning after elections in Nigeria, rather than count votes, citizens wistfully count dead bodies of neighbours, friends and other loved ones killed in election-related violence!

In its final report on Nigeria’s 2015 General Elections, the European Union Observation Mission (EUOM) wrote about the electoral context within which that election was conducted: “The security situation, the large population, infrastructure challenges, and the fierce political competition, made for an extremely challenging election environment…the campaign environment was extremely competitive and tense. Incidents were reported in all parts of the country resulting in more than 160 people killed in election-related violence since January”.

The report quoted above no doubt pushes to the fore, the electoral context of 2015. But truth be told, it is not much different from that of 2019, and all the indices mentioned therein (security situation, large population, infrastructure challenges and fierce political competition) still remain today and have become distasteful recipes for chaos, violence and death when thrown in the mix of elections within a country sharply divided by religion and ethnicity like Nigeria.

Going by the EUOM Report and those of other local and international observer missions on Nigeria’s elections since 1999, the background of elections in Nigeria is indicative of the county’s reluctance, if not unwillingness, to imbibe the full ideals of democracy and move from bedlam, where it is currently anchored to the ‘Utopia’ its founding fathers envisaged at independence. Indeed, Nigeria’s past electoral experiences and the most recent one for that matter seem to confirm its macabre fixation with violent and controversial electoral contexts–a sad reminder that it is not ready to be influenced by international best practices of democratic governance.

Even though over the years, there have been various attempts by different state actors like the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the National Assembly, the media and Civil Society Organizations to help strengthen electoral processes in Nigeria, much of those attempts have either been browbeaten by the government in power or largely subverted by major political actors who think their positions would be weakened by such progressive ideas. Hence, it came as a pleasant surprise, when in the 2015 Presidential Election, the opposition won for the first time since transition from military rule in 1999 and the incumbent Presidential candidate, Goodluck Jonathan conceded defeat in what has since been hailed as a selfless and patriotic action rarely seen in Nigeria and Africa.

However, in like manner as the turn of events in 2015,  the 2019 Presidential Election that gave  Buhari and Osinbajo a second term ticket would have gone the same way as 2015 had the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) not woken from its slumber and exploited the aforementioned electoral context to its own advantage like Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) did for the most part of its 16 year reign.

For clearly, in spite of the sparkling visage of President Muhamadu Buhari that was paraded by his handlers and supporters before the February 23rd, 2019 general elections, the man’s credibility as a champion of integrity and one with the  intellectual capacity to turn the fortunes of  the country around, had suffered serious decline way before the first ballot was cast.

According to some critics, not much had been seen in terms of progress in the nation’s economy and the “Change” promised during his 2015 electioneering campaign had done nothing but foist untold hardship on the people. In fact, his health, intellectual capacity and patriotism were called into serious question as he stalled in responding to the farmers/herders crisis, displayed clannishness in some of his political appointments, spent several months abroad on medical vacation and seemed to fight corruption more within the quarters of the opposition rather than his own party.

Added to the worsening situation for Buhari was the intra-party wrangling spurred by egotistical grandstanding of megalomaniacs within his own  party. Adams Oshiomhole, Rochas Okorocha and Ibikunle Amosu all readily come to mind when one considers this. For, who could forget how the President, along with his campaign train, was pelted in Abeokuta, Ogun state, where supporters of Ibikunle Amosu, the state governor who was at loggerheads with the APC  leadership because his anointed governorship candidate was denied the party’s governorship ticket, gave vent to their aversion for the party hierarchy or how  Rochas Okorocha, who introduced APC to the southeast, supported another political party against his own APC because he was not allowed to install his son-in-law as governor after him?

Fortunately for President Muhammadu Buhari, the main opposition party of the PDP inadvertently furthered his cause by presenting a weather-beaten and much vilified former Nigeria’s Vice President, Atiku Abubakar as its Presidential candidate–a fine gentleman by all standards but one with several allegations of greed and corruption hanging round his neck.

Atiku’s candidacy no doubt gave a new twist to the Presidential race as soon as he emerged candidate of the PDP, having tried a number of times on different party platforms to clinch the Presidential ticket and lost. And, just like the man he would be challenging, who contested the Presidency 3 times and lost, it was believed in some quarters that Atiku Abubakar, in the face of all Buhari’s indiscretions, might just as well spring the same surprise Buhari sprung in 2015 by defeating the incumbent.

At first the ruling APC, deluded by the larger than life and incorruptible portrait of President Buhari, and apparently still basking in the euphoria of its ascendancy to political power in Nigeria gained on the back of its “Change” mantra, dismissed Atiku Abubakar as no threat while relying on allegations of corruption against him and his inability to travel to the US owing to a pending criminal case with the Justice Department to discredit his candidacy. Although, it was later revealed by some media houses in the US how a certain Nigerian politician hired a Trump lobbyist to obtain visa for Atiku to enter the United States.

By the time the Buhari Campaign Organization realized Atiku Abubakar was no pushover and could pose a serious enough  threat to the ambition of its own candidate, he had travelled to and returned from the US, gained  traction with his ‘restructuring’ promise and drawn enough crowd to rival that of Buhari.  That was when the momentum changed and the Buhari team realized the election might not be a landslide in favour of the President as they had previously thought.

Putting in perspective the revolt-vote against APC in the Osun and Ekiti governorship elections of 2018 which the Party won in controversial circumstances, mass defection of party bigwigs to the opposition party,  the letter written by former President Olusegun Obasanjo detailing Buhari’s misdemeanours and his subsequent endorsement of Atiku among other embarrassments, the ruling party quickly felt the pulse of public opinion on the Buhari Presidency and knew it had to step up its game.

Stepping up the game, for the Buhari team, meant employing the strategies of classical rhetoricians–that is, playing up on the strengths and achievements of the administration and denigrating the opposition candidate to discredit him before Nigerians. The gimmick forced most Nigerians who wanted to vote right between the two front liners to take stock of the merits and demerits of both candidates, weighing them to determine the one with the least liabilities, because let’s face, it was a choice between the rock and a hard place for most people.

Buhari had disappointed a lot of Nigerians who supported his candidacy in 2015 mainly because of his tardiness in handling matters of urgent national importance. And to be sincere, he never lost most of his die-hard supporters either. However some supporters who wanted the best out of him became his harshest critics: pestering and criticizing him. In the end, Buhari saved the nation from the mindless looting and profligacy of the PDP years, invested heavily in infrastructure as had never been done  in the recent past and recovered a number of Nigeria’s stolen assets.

Atiku too, on his own part, had disappointed Nigerians with the way he superintended the privatization of Nigeria’s assets during the Obasanjo era. He was accused of buying up most of the assets mainly to enrich himself and selling the rest to his friends and while still on his campaign trail, he insisted he would sell more Nigerian assets.

As a matter of conjecture, maybe what made the difference in Nigeria’s 2019 Presidential Election between the victor and the vanquished was the adoption of the saying: “the devil you know is better than the angel you don’t“.

But integrity notwithstanding, Nigeria of the 21st Century requires a quick-witted, firm, competent, detribalized and just leader. The question was: did President Muhammadu Buhari measure up to all of those in his first term to merit another term? And was the former Vice President Atiku Abubakar a better replacement for President Buhari?

Either way, the electorate spoke on the 23rd of February 2019 and President Buhari, along with his Vice, Professor ‘Yemi Osinbajo, was reelected for a 2nd and final term of 4 years with a total of 15,191,847 votes to beat his main challenger, Atiku Abubakar, who polled 10,782,007 votes.

However, the margin of victory becomes instructive on the one hand, if allegations of voter suppression in areas where the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had its stronghold were anything to go by; and on the other, because the margin ought to have sent a warning signal to the winning party to work more for the benefit of the people lest they turn all their votes over to the opposition at the next electoral cycle.

For President Buhari and his team, the next four years should be all work and no play as no excuses for non performance would be accepted by Nigerians expectant of good governance and dividends of democracy. Enough time has already been given to learn the ropes. The past four years produced not much for the citizens, who put in so much and staked so highly for the Buhari administration. The convenient excuse usually put forward by politicians of the sheer impossibility of repairing the damage done for 16 years in 4 years would be thrown back at their faces by impatient Nigerians who want to see their nation’s economy grow, their people lifted out of poverty and their children safe and back in school.

Let the President be reminded that this would be no time to soft pedal on the anti corruption war, rather it is time to pursue more vigorously and secure more timely convictions for looters of the nation’s commonwealth. Not just big looters for that matter, but also greedy civil servants whose palm must be greased before services could be rendered as well as the Policeman or Road Safety Official who extort motorists everyday for quick, dirty cash.

May the President also be persuaded that this is the time to sign off on the Electoral bill so as to build on the appreciable gains INEC has made over the past 20 years and correct its systemic flaws that leave room for manipulation of election results–a fact that makes a mockery of our warped type of democracy in the process.

By 2023, President Muhamadu Buhari’s Presidency would have run for 8 full years and his stewardship would have been in vain if after another 4 years of trying, he still continues to give excuses.