#OsunDecides2018: The gladiators, their stakes and the final battle

 #OsunDecides2018: The gladiators, their stakes and the final battle

A popular political axiom that power belongs to the people can be said to have received further affirmation from the conduct of the Osun State governorship election which held on Saturday, although inconclusive. The process is expected to end on Thursday after elections are held across seven polling units in four local governments.

The ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) was technically defeated by the opposition Peoples Democratic Party with a slim 353 votes after a tortuous run of intrigues, subterfuge and shrewd politicking by the parties in the contest. That the APC, in spite of its standing, power and influence in the current political dispensation, failed to finish tops on Saturday, foretells the preparedness of voters to put the incumbents on their toes in future elections.

When it was expected to end suddenly in a mix of celebration and mollification, it was rather a declaration of no victor, nor vanquish. Back to the ring, the umpire pointed. The election was declared inconclusive because the margin of victory of 353 votes was far less than the total number of registered voters in seven polling units cancelled by INEC. Ademola Adeleke of the PDP, the “winner” of the election, scored a total of 254,698 votes to beat his All Progressives Congress rival, Gboyega Oyetola, who polled 254, 345 votes.

The decision of the INEC not to return Mr Adeleke as the winner was predicated on the INEC guidelines which anticipate that the cancelled votes could actually be a decider should that be accounted for at the polls, especially if the difference in the number of votes scored by the winner and the runner up is less than the number of votes cancelled. Consequently the Osun governorship election could not produce a clear winner because the total number of votes expected from the seven polling units cancelled was 3,498 votes.

The units cancelled where elections would hold on Thursday are Polling Unit 002, Ward 10 in Ife North Local Government Area; Polling Unit 12, Olode Ward 07 in Ife South Local Government Area; Polling Unit 10, Osi Ward 8, Ife South; Polling Unit 001, Ward 08, Orolu Local Government Area; Polling Unit 004, Ward 08, and Polling Unit 003, Ward 09 both in Orolu Local Government Area and Polling Unit 17, Ward 5, Osogbo Local Government Area.

Speaking on why elections were cancelled in these polling units, the Resident Electoral Commissioner for Osun State, Olusegun Agbaje, said “In Ife North, Ward 10, PU2, number of votes was more than accredited voters.”

In Ife South, Olode Ward 07, PU12, Adereti Village, Mr Agbaje said there was disruption of election by hoodlums who shot sporadically. And in the process of scampering for safety, the Presiding Officer misplaced the form EC8A for the PU and all efforts to get it were unsuccessful.

For Ife South, Osi Ward 8 PU10, Aluti Erin Primary School, Albert village, the REC reported that election was conducted with manual accreditation. He said in Orolu Ward 08 PU 001, Kajola village, there was hijacking of materials by thugs. The same case of hijacking of ballot box was recorded for Polling Unit 004, Ward 08, Idi Iya village and Polling Unit 003, Ward 09 Gbogbo Primary School in Orolu.

The most curious of them all was the case in Polling Unit 17, Ward 5 in Osogbo Local Government Area where the presiding officer simply absconded with the results of the election at the unit.

The National Youth Service Corps has said the presiding officer who absconded with results was not a member of the corps, as his identity is still to be known. He is said to be one of the ad-hoc staff hired by INEC to complement the efforts of the corps members.

A record 48 political parties participated in Saturday’s governorship election. Although they were many, only five made the needed electoral impact and received valued attention from the electorate. While some complained that they were affected by the over-monetisation of the process, there was a dead silence from many more, whose campaigns did not go beyond the billboard show. Fortunately for a few others, the organised election debate was a major platform to interface with the people who had time to watch the debate live on either Channels Television or TVC.

Saturday’s election was generally adjudged as peaceful. INEC made a record in deploying to the various units at an average time of 9 a.m. There were fewer cases of card reader malfunctioning, and where they could not be fixed, they were immediately replaced. There were fewer cases of ballot box snatching or disruption by hoodlums.

There was also no need for the usual show of force by armed security agencies as they did in Ekiti State in July. INEC scored a B in curtailing the practice of vote buying in most of the polling units. Although financial inducements continued, it was however done behind the scenes and therefore became difficult for the buyers to ascertain whether the sellers of votes actually delivered on their promises. That is not to say that some polling booths were not open for vote showing as they were too close to those who could perpetrate the famed “see and buy” malpractice.

The candidates of the different political parties could be credited for the “calm” political environment that prevailed throughout the election process. Although there were reports of skirmishes at campaign rallies, they were isolated cases, and there were no reprisals. The candidates pursued their campaigns with decorum and focused on defeating their opponents instead of simply running down their opponents.

The rallies were more of entertainment and boastful promises, such as “we will win on Saturday,” “We defeated them before, we will defeat them again,” etcetera. All the “mega rallies” were well attended and the campaigns added value to the economy of traders around the cities where they held.

Besides the PDP and the APC candidates, the ADP, ADC and the SDP candidates weighed seriously on the political balance, making it difficult ab initio, to determine where the pendulum would swing. The APC is in government with its candidate is favoured by the establishment and the powers from Lagos. The SDP is politically an old war horse, whose political influence transcends his Ife area. The PDP candidate, although a political green horn, enjoys an overwhelming sentiment, drawing from the political history of his late brother, Isiaka Adeleke, on whose demise he aspired to the Senate and now to become the governor of Osun State. The sentiment of zoning has also brought him closer to the finishing line ahead of other contestants. Moshood Adeoti and Fatai Akinbade, ADP and ADC candidates respectively, who appeared to be laggards in the contest, portrayed themselves persons with significant following.

Behind the façade of electioneering campaign was the ever existing plot to knock out the opponent on technical grounds. The certificate saga of Mr Adeleke was a sore point in the campaign of the PDP. The police rolled salt over the injuries when it came out with an eleventh hour revelation of examination malpractice, rolled out the charges and actually arraigned the PDP candidate in a court of law in Abuja. This smacks of desperation appeared to be glaringly embarrassing to the extent it drew the attention of the presidency, whose officials released information that President Muhammadu Buhari had asked the police to suspend any invitation to Mr Adeleke until after the election.

Unpaid salaries of Osun workers remained in the front burner. It hunted the ruling party throughout the campaigns. There was no escaping the fact. The people are angry and hungry. The promises will no longer be entertained. Even the last minute rush to settle arrears did much but not enough to win back the lost support.

Why was it difficult for Messrs Adeleke and Omisore to combine forces and dethrone the APC candidate with little energy rather than go it separately? This question arose at different fora, and was posed before Mr Omisore while he addressed the media on his alliance with Messrs Adeoti and Akinbade to root out the APC. The PDP was not part of that alliance. He had explained that an alliance with the parties as a single force was not possible because of the differences in ideologies and party focus. Judging from the votes scored by the candidates as announced by the INEC, an alliance between the PDP and the SDP would have yielded an easy victory against the APC.

Indications were that the parties made efforts to reach a consensus, but failed because all the dramatis personae were not willing to compromise their well-earned places as leaders of their parties and being candidates with equal chances to win the governorship election. Mr Omisore was sarcastic when he referred to the PDP as a party uncertain about its candidate 24 hours to the election. “We are not aware that some parties signed agreement with the PDP,” he said. “We are not even sure that the PDP has a candidate as at today, so how can a virtual party be talking of signing with real parties.”

“They are in crisis up till today and we don’t know what will happen to them tomorrow. All we know is that SDP is going to the polls and we are going to deliver Osun State from the jaundiced and corrupt government of APC.” It is however uncertain if this misgiving played any role in his decision not to pitch his tent with the PDP and rather chose to form an alliance with the APC ahead of Thursday’s rerun election.

As the results poured in on Saturday night, there were cries of manipulation. This came from the PDP which felt it was leading following the results declared from the polling units. There was unwarranted delays of the results from the ward collation centres which gave rise to suspicion that there were plots to change the results in favour of the APC. For example, the results from ward 4 and 5, in Osogbo were not ready until the early hours of Sunday. In fact the result from Osogbo was not turned in at the state collation centre until about 7am on Sunday. It was therefore not surprising when the collation officer reported that a presiding officer walked away with the result of one of the polling units.

The delay of results amidst fears that the results were being manipulated engendered restiveness among supporters of the PDP who immediately thronged the INEC secretariat prepared to foment trouble. Security operatives then took pleasure in firing bullets into the air to scare and disperse the gathering mob. The effect was a sudden panic with the local government INEC secretariat where the results were being awaited. Women scampered for safety at the hall where the results were being announced. Those outside the gate, rushed in to avoid being hit by a stray bullet. The same thing occurred at the state collation centre. The police this time pumped enough teargas in the air, which made it difficult for observers and journalists, including the electoral officials present to breath.

As the results trickled in and were being announced, an “error” of recording manifested. A result from Ayedaade local government was contested by the agent of the PDP, Dele Adeleke. His protest was succinct. PDP’s score as recorded in form EC60E was 10,836. But while announcing the result, the figures read was 9,836, 1000 votes less than what was expected. The observation further heightened the fears of a plot to deny the PDP the needed victory.

An INEC staff who was asked to go and remove the form EC60E and replace it with a new one after the figures were changed was immediately apprehended by vigilant party supporters who accused him of conspiring to change the figures of the election from the local government. INEC had immediately insisted that the new figure was the correct one, as the 10, 836 was an error made by the collating officers at the point of entering in the results. The uproar from the controversies was newsworthy, with the INEC staff, Mutiu Salawu, confessing that he was only sent by his superior to make the changes.

However, Mr Agbaje, the INEC REC had clarified the issues and confirmed that the initial figure recorded for the PDP was indeed an error. He said when the matter was raised by Dele Adeleke at the state collation centre, the original copies of the results sheets, forms EC 8A, EC 8B and EC 8C, for the LGA were examined and found to be the correct reflection of the results as reported by the LGA Collation Officer, Ayotunde Adeagbo, a staff of the Federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA).

“The LGA Collation Officer, Prof. Adeagbo, accepted the fact that there was an error in the EC 60 (E) pasted at the LGA Collation Centre, especially the figure (10,836) recorded for PDP on the poster which is different from the actual votes scored (9,836) by the PDP,” Mr Agbaje said.

“It should be noted that the INEC staff, Salawu Mutiu Kolawole, did not destroy the Result Sheet for the said election for they are intact in the custody of the Commission and copies of same are with agents of the 48 political parties that contested the Governorship Election.”

Declaring the election as inconclusive met with mixed reactions from both parties. While the APC commended INEC for reaching such decision, the PDP complained that it was an attempt to deny it of the hard earned victory.

A rerun is scheduled and less than 3,498 voters are expected to make the final decision. However, there are views that the actual voters with PVCs within the designated polling units may not amount to 1000 at the end of the day. The struggle for these votes is the reason for the efforts by the APC and the PDP to get the endorsement of the SDP candidate, Iyiola Omisore. Some political observers have opined that if his decision to pitch his tent with the APC fails to go down well with his supporters, then he might just be a harbinger of bad luck for the ruling party.

Now that the bride seems to have been wooed and won, the champions are certain to face the battle on Thursday, whether on a high ground or in the valley. The people have made a point. They have the power and would give it to whomever they desire. If INEC fortifies the process with vigilance and transparency, then we can be assured that only the votes of Osun citizens will decide who becomes the next governor of the state.