By: Demian Igbokwe
Election is usually a process that test the fundamentals of procedural and substantive democracy. Nigerians have gone through the process and what is left is for candidates through the procedural institutions of democracy to test the validity of the process through the tribunals and courts. Going forward, all these will help to shape or undermine our electoral process in terms of reforms or a decline to the worst.
There has been a change in public conduct concerning democratic elections around Nigeria but the South East still occupys a vantage position. An old order shall persist. This order seems to be very difficult to erode despite social, economic and structural changes. In most South East States, democratic elections are still very expensive and this situation permits those who have captured and stolen public funds to exert enormous influence on procedural democratic institutions like INEC, Security agencies and the Courts. These corrupt operators of the old order pocket these institutions and manipulate them just to stay in power at the expense of public indifference.
They resort to manipulating results of votes cast. This trend coupled with public apathy remains acceptable. Conceding that no two or three elections are the same but the divergencies in the outcome of the Presidential and Governorship election requires reconciliation based on local realities in the South East.
Most of the APC candidates were rigged out, despite the party fielding the most popularly, acceptable candidates in some of the States. Results were indeed rigged and manipulated at the INEC collation centers by operators of the old order who have serially engaged in this criminal electoral enterprise.
One of the candidates his mandate was robbed by this coalition of the terrible is the Abia APC Governorship candidate – Dr Uche Ogah.
-This broke the hearts and minds of Igbos across Nigeria.
-His support base cut across all nooks and crannies of Abia State.
-He was the man to beat in any credible contest.
-He toured the State through wards to Local Government Areas and met the people in their homes.
-He presented a plan for a new Abia and the people widely accepted his programmes.
-He re-energized an appeal and a huge support base for APC in Abia State.
-He stood out amongst the people but alas! The ilegitimate order of electoral criminality and brigandage took over and he was rigged out.
Before the advent of Dr. Ogah into the APC, the entire Abia people detested the party. None wanted to hear APC in Abia State. The party was treated like a leper. In a nutshell, there was never a party in the place of APC in Abia.
Dr. Uchechukwu Sampson Ogah is the only candidate in the South East APC that scored 5 over 5 in the polling arrangement of the 2019 elections.
Dr. Ogah proved to be a true party man when he delivered the President, a Senator and the House of Representative candidate in his Local government, while on the day of his election, APC also won both House of Assembly and the gubernatorial election in his Isuikwuato LGA.
If there is one candidate in the South East that even the citizens of the neighboring State were so sure before the election that he will win, that candidate was Dr. Uche Ogah.
A lot of Abia people, who have never seen anything good in APC, vowed to vote for Dr. Uche Ogah even if he contest elections as an independent candidate. He was the only candidate in the South East that enjoyed such support from the people of his State.
The college of Bishops and churches across the State, came out openly to identify with APC, because, Dr. Ogah was flying the party’s flag as the gubernatorial candidate.
The APC as a matter of need, should choose carefully who to appoint from each of the South Eastern States to the Federal Executive Council.
For the party to make any further impact in the South East in 2023, the party must demand for the results of the 2019 elections from Polling booths, Wards and LGAs of every person seeking federal appointments.
If APC has more of Dr. Ogah’s type across the South East, the party would have made a greater impact in the 2019 elections across the South East
What happened in Abia on the day of the gubernatorial election, was a charade and show of shame. In other developed societies, Dr. Valentine and Prof. Ozurumba should have been cooling their feet in prison.
Dr Uche Ogah indeed stood out.
God bless Nigeria
Igbokwe wrote from Abia
