In this information age, every editor’s worst nightmare is how to discern the wheat from the chaff that they are fed with from different sources on a big news day.  Starting from the social networks, electronic mail, BlackBerry instant messenger, regular SMS and phone calls, to good old television, coupled with all the wireless gadgets that enable us keep a tab on everything that’s happening, it’s a miracle that we’re still able to scramble through the information overload and make sense of it all.

One story that hit my BlackBerry on election night last Saturday from Abuja was on the allegation made by the presidential candidate of the Congress for Progressive Change General Muhammadu Buhari, in which he was reported to have forewarned of a plot to rig the presidential election in Borno, Katsina and Katsina States. What I found most befuddling about the story was that all the opinion polls before the election had forecast that these three states, among others in the north-east and north-west, were Buhari’s strongholds where he was expected to pull off electoral victories.

True to their forecasts, early results from polling centres in those three states on Saturday night showed that Buhari’s CPC was beating the rival Peoples Democratic Party and other parties comfortably in the said states and a couple of others in the north. So on what basis was this allegation made. Was it anticipatory or said out of a whim just because Nigeria has a history of electoral fraud?
The irony is that Buhari won all the three states over which he cried wolf. I wonder if he still stands by his allegation that rigging was afoot in those states. Perhaps now that the results in those states have cast doubt on his aspersions, may be he would have to throw his sights on other states where he lost to give his claims some credibility.

The fact is that not many people with a keen grasp of Nigerian politics gave Buhari much of a chance of winning Saturday’s presidential election. His past continues to haunt him and no matter how many excuses he has made for suspending the Nigerian Constitution and truncating our democratic process in December 1983, Buhari would always be partly to blame for setting this country back several decades.

His brand of politics has never helped him much either. It is not enough to give off the semblance of one who is honest and modest. Quite frankly, honesty and politics are two diametrically opposite concepts that hardly go hand in hand. To win in a complex country like Nigeria requires a degree of sophistication, political savvy and compromise. Of course, incumbency is also a factor, but not entirely insurmountable with the resources, right strategy and the support base. These factors have always been missing in Buhari’s bid for the presidency and their absence, proved to be his undoing.

In his three attempts to rule this country through the ballot, Buhari has always banked on his persona and the ability of one section of this country to deliver that ambition. His strategy has always been premised on the mass following he has in the north to sweep him to victory, forgetting that the voter register compiled by an electoral body is never a good indicator of the number of people who would actually come out to vote. Even in a watershed election set to alter the course of history, voter turnout is a major factor in determining the victory of a candidate, that is, after voters certain to cast their votes for rival parties might have been discounted.

More critical to Buhari’s electoral (mis)fortunes was the platform on which he has always contested. From the All Nigeria Peoples Party to the CPC, Buhari’s choice of parties has always been limited by their spread. No regional party in this country can make an appreciable dent in a presidential election if it lacks geographical presence in almost every state of the federation.

Granted that this requires resources and the foot soldiers to achieve the national spread, but this could have been achieved if The Buhari Organisation had seen the need to merge with other parties at least two to three years in the run up to another election cycle. Yes he toyed around with the idea at some point, but Buhari jettisoned it purely for selfish motives. Possibly he was afraid that subjugating himself to a much larger, stronger party that could throw up alternative contenders with much better credentials might have ruined his bid for the presidency, a situation he was unwilling to contemplate.  

Another factor that was Buhari’s undoing particularly in this election was the misconception that he would secure enough votes to force a run-off election. Any politician not confident enough to envision victory through the first ballot, should never contemplate contesting an election in the first place. It is only those contemplating defeat that begin to count on a second ballot to win an election.

But what I find most curious is that even when the opportunity to force a second ballot was placed squarely in Buhari’s lap, he still somehow managed to fritter it away. Though the so-called progressive politics (whatever that means) of the Action Congress of Nigeria is anathema to those of us with a preference for smaller government and less state intervention, Buhari should have grabbed at the offer made by ACN to form an alliance to really give the PDP a run for its money. Without the alliance, neither of the parties – CPC and ACN – could have made a meaningful dent in the dominance of the PDP. Yet, with just a few days left to the presidential election, he blew the biggest chance ever to achieve his long nursed ambition.   
Now that Buhari has for the third time been unlucky, many of us ponder the fate of the CPC. Like ANPP, the CPC became over-reliant on the myth and personality surrounding Buhari. It is no surprise that more than half of the members of his party (CPC) joined it because they could ride on his coattails to electoral victory. With his certain withdrawal from future presidential races, it is very likely that they would begin to seek other platforms where they can remain relevant and are more certain of their future.

Having giving it his all, including shedding tears for his beloved Nigeria last week, Buhari must be wondering what lies ahead. Although he has been rejected by the electorate three times in a row, he need not retire completely from partisan politics. A credible opposition is still necessary if we must improve governance and build lasting democratic structures. Perhaps Buhari can play a role in nurturing and building that opposition. But it must be an opposition not just desirous of wresting power from PDP for the sake of doing so. It must be one that must be visionary and is a true alternative. The way I see it, that opposition still does not exist in this country. I do not see it in the ACN, nor do I see it in the ANPP or the CPC. Until that happens, the PDP will continue to have its day in the sun at the expense of smaller, noisy parties.

Posted by admin on Apr 22 2011. Filed under Articles, Elections 2011, Muhammadu Buhari (1983-85, 2015 - 2023), NNP Columnists, Presidency. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry