“If there be no enemy there’s no fight. If no fight, no victory and if no victory there is no crown.”
—Thomas Carlyle
By Omoniyi Salaudeen
It’s not a pyrrhic victory, but certainly not the kind anyone will wish for himself. It’s a hard-won battle no one will like to ordinarily experience for whatever it worth. In Nigeria’s democratic history, never had any elected president been so mocked, abused, battered and publicly scrutinized as Bola Tinubu, whose legitimacy of office has just been affirmed by the Supreme Court judgment delivered on Thursday.
The ruling of the apex court on the consolidated petitions filed by the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar and his Labour Party counterpart, Peter Obi, challenging his declaration as president is an anti-climax of the multilayer battles he has had to contend with since he made his popular Emilokan (self-possessive Yoruba language denoting, it’s my turn) pronouncement in Abeokuta in the wake of the primaries of the ruling All Progress Congress (APC).
Within and outside the party, his adversaries took the statement with a pinch of salt, accusing him of turning the position of president into a birth right. While emotion ran wild, he kept his eyes on the ball. In spite of all the hurdles laid in his way by the power that be, he won the ticket of the APC, beating all his co-contenders with a landslide. That victory sparked off social media campaign of calumny and denigration raising public concerns over his medical fitness, age declaration, accusation of drug scandal, issue of certificate, as well as the source of his wealth.
Yet, he absorbed the insults and molestation without caring a hoot about the implication of all these on his chances of winning. Instead, he concentrated his energies on his strategy, entered the race with guts and fortitude, campaigned vigorously across the country and eventually won the election.
According to the result declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Tinubu polled a total of 8,794,726 votes to beat his closest rival, Atiku Abubakar, who scored 6,984,520 votes in the February 25 presidential and National Assembly elections. He also scored over 25 per cent of the votes cast in 30 states, more than the 25 states constitutionally required, but lost in the Federal Capital Territory.
Obi, whose campaign attracted young people and urban voters fed up with corrupt politics, scored 6,101,533 as a third place runner, winning most votes in the commercial hub of Lagos State, as well as the FCT. Rabiu Kwankwaso of the NNPP came a distance fourth with 1,496,687 votes.
However, people were discontent with the results due to the refusal of the INEC to transmit results electronically to the IReV server real-time. The electoral commission had begun announcing state-by-state results before it suddenly announced the suspension of the process, citing technical glitches as its reason for the action.
This, combined with other sundry allegations of certificate forgery, the issue of the special status of FCT, which Tinubu didn’t win, formed the main ground of Atiku and Obi’s petition.
With the Supreme Court judgment delivered on Thursday, all of these matters have been laid to rest. It has been celebration galore among the supporters of the APC and the associates of President Tinubu. Like the rainwaters, relief came to the party and the presidency alike due to the complexity of issues involved in the petition. But for the country, it speaks to the question of the future survival of democracy as there is already a lack of confidence in the electoral process.
This is a genuine concern because no government can function effectively in the absence of social capital-trust and confidence that exist between the government and the governed. As some legal professionals have argued, the issue of IReV is the prerogative of the INEC since there is no constitutional provision, making it mandatory that election results must be transmitted electronically.
However, it suffices to say that INEC shot itself in the leg when it ordered the suspension of the results, having told the world time and again that the results would be viewed on the IReV portal. Beyond the issue of credibility, there is also the burden of moral rectitude on the part of the commission. As things stand now, it will be almost impossible for the commission to conduct free, fair and credible elections in the future without first and foremost redeeming its image. The way to redeem itself is to adhere strictly to the rules of engagement collectively signed with the parties.
Part of this responsibility lies with the National Assembly to evolve a time-tested Electoral Act that will guarantee credibility of the process. At any level of government, no candidate can win by default and expect to earn the confidence of the electorate. In a democracy, confidence is sine qua non to the legitimacy of authority. Regrettably, this is what INEC took for granted by its action or inaction in the last presidential election. And the lesson of it should serve as a guide for the future of the country’s evolving democracy.
For those who infused emotion into politics, this is a time for deep reflection and genuine introspection. Perhaps, it may sound logical to say that President Tinubu might not have won under best of arrangement, but the reality of the matter is that he got his strategy right.
In politics, as in conventional warfare, what matters is not your own strategy per se, but the strategy of your enemy. A battle is easily won when enemies are divided. Tinubu went a nautical mile ahead of Atiku the day Obi pulled out of the PDP to pick the ticket of the Labour Party. As a matter of fact, not a few pundits had predicted the outcome of the election in favour of Tinubu as swirling tide of Obedient Movement significantly undercut PDP’s chances in all its areas of influence. As a first time runner, Obi has undoubtedly made a mark, but his lack of structure made his defeat possible. Unlike Atiku, a perennial hardy-contender, who has reached the nadir of his political career, Obi will certainly do better in a foreseeable future.
Now that elections matters are over, it’s time for President Tinubu to leave the distractions of the past behind and focus on the economy of the country so that the poor can breathe. At present, the new regime of subsidy removal, soaring exchange rate of the dollar to the naira, food inflation are choking the common man. Something urgent and drastic needs to be done to save the masses from the current hardship of the economy; otherwise, his Renewed Hope agenda will turn to be a rope of sand.
President Tinubu is a former governor of Lagos State who is known to have built bridges across the country. Though with many myths around him, he has earned laurel for himself as a shrewd politician. Among other factors, this is what he brought to bear in his presidential contest that gave him victory.
