By Hakeem Azeez
The All Progressives Congress, APC asserted its dominance in the local government and governorship elections held in Kwara State and Edo State on Saturday, September 21st 2024 respectively. While the Kwara APC cleared all the 16 local governments, the Edo APC took over power from the ruling People's Democratic Party with over 40,000 votes, highlighting the party's popularity and acceptance among Nigerians.
Both the Kwara and Edo elections have been described as the most peaceful, freest, fairest and credible elections in recent times by local observers. However, since the electoral umpires for both elections declared the candidates of the APC as the winners, the opposition PDP has been wailing and pointing at nonexistent irregularities which is commonplace in Nigerian politics.
For instance, in Edo, the PDP have reluctantly said they would contest the outcome at the competent court of law while their Kwara counterparts have shamelessly taken their protest to the Emir's palace calling the monarch all sorts of horrible names as if he was the Kwara State Independent Electoral Commission, KWSIEC that conducted the elections and declared the candidates of the APC winners according to the counted votes.
Political analysts have pointed out the reasons why Kwara APC and Edo APC coast to victory in their respective elections. In Kwara, analysts said the APC is more popular than the PDP, which they said ruled the north-central state for 16 years with nothing to show for it other than corruption, misappropriation of public funds, non-payment of salaries and all forms of maladministration.
Analysts also said the outstanding performance of Kwara State Governor Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq in education, sports, infrastructure and workers' welfarism, among others, played crucial roles in securing the candidates of the APC victory at the polls. They argued that if the governor had performed below par in his less than six years in office like his predecessors, the party would have become infamous among the people.
They also pointed to the exceptional records of some of the candidates of the APC. They noted that many of them had good records as public servants and businessmen and women, making the electorate in their various wards trooped out en masse to cast their votes for them. For instance, they remarked Hon Podo of Ilorin South and Hon Ladan of Ilorin West as a blessing to their immediate communities.
However, in Edo, analysts said the sitting governor, Godwin Obaseki failed the people of the state despite the full support he was given during the electioneering for his reelection. However, rather than for the governor to reciprocate the kind gesture of the Edo people with good governance and exemplary, he became power-drunk and paid them back with underdevelopment, hardship and an unprecedented unemployment rate.
In addition, they said Governor Obaseki isn't a unifier and does not know how to manage people. They said that the governor fought with all the people who helped him to become a governor and those who made his reelection possible. They noted that in the last two years, he has fallen out with most of the influential people in the party who later joined the APC. They concluded that Obaseki's abysmal performance and unnecessary face-off with the party faithful made the APC Victory a walk in the park.
Azeez, a public affairs analyst writes from Ilorin.
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