Presidential vote results show north-south split

Posted by admin Elections 2011, Goodluck Jonathan (2010-present), Presidency Sunday, April 17th, 2011

Nigeria’s presidential election has been given an initial thumbs up by observers, but early indications on Sunday showed sharp divisions between the mainly Muslim north and mostly Christian south.

While President Goodluck Jonathan was the favourite going in to the race in Africa’s most populous nation, turnout appeared especially high in the north, the power base of his main opponent, ex-military ruler Muhammadu Buhari.

Early results from various districts published by local newspapers showed Buhari performing well in the north and Jonathan strong in the south, raising the possibility of a runoff between the two.

Given the size of Nigeria — a country of some 150 million people — it remained too early to draw any firm conclusions on Saturday’s vote.

The electoral commission has said it intends to release full results within 48 hours after the end of voting in Africa’s largest oil producer.

“There’s good news in this Nigerian presidential election: we’re counting actual votes and people are interested in the count,” said Chidi Odinkalu of the Open Society Justice Initiative NGO.

“And quite bad news: the country is badly divided, north vs. south.”

It is a scenario many analysts had hoped to avoid in a country as fractious as Nigeria, a nation of some 250 ethnic groups and roughly divided in half between Christians and Muslimswp_posts