Bola Tinubu wins controversial presidential election in Nigeria

The former governor of Lagos received 8.8 million votes in the weekend vote, well ahead of his peers, the election commission said Wednesday. The opposition strongly criticized the elections and called for the polls to be cancelled.

According to the Election Commission, Tinubu won at least 25 percent of the vote in two-thirds of the 36 states. The candidate of the social-democratic party APC thus also fulfilled the second condition to be declared the winner.

“This is a serious mandate that I hereby accept,” the 70-year-old said at an election party at APC party headquarters in the capital Abuja. “I call on my competitors to work with us. It’s the only nation we have.”

Outgoing President Muhammadu Buhari congratulated Tinubu on his electoral success. He was “the best person for this post,” Buhari wrote on Twitter.

Opposition speaks of mock elections

According to the election commission, the two main opposition candidates ended up behind Tinubu, whose parties had already raised serious accusations against the conduct of the election and called for its annulment before the election was even counted.

Allegations were also leveled against the winner, who held the post of governor in Lagos from 1999 to 2007 and was seen as a kingmaker in previous elections. His opponents accuse Tinubu, one of Nigeria’s richest politicians, of bribery and too close ties with Buhari, among other things.

According to the election commission, former vice president Atiku Abubakar of the largest opposition party, the PDP, received 6.9 million votes and failed a presidential candidate for the sixth time. Peter Obi of the Labor Party received 6.1 million votes. Both parties had spoken of a “sham election” on Tuesday. The “entire election” had been “irretrievably compromised”, they stated in reference to issues with the Count, among other things.

The Election Commission rejected the allegations. Voting on Saturday was largely peaceful, but marked by long delays. For the first time, the Electoral Commission biometrically registered voters and uploaded the count results electronically. According to European Union observers, this led to enormous logistical problems in implementation.

Challenges in Nigeria

Nearly 90 million eligible voters were called on Saturday to nominate the successor to President Buhari, who was out of office after two terms. In addition to the new president, both chambers of parliament were re-elected. Of the 90 million voters, nearly 10 million were newly registered voters – many of them under the age of 34.

The promising PvdA candidate Peter Obi in particular appealed to this young group of voters. The challenger, with his election promise of political change, managed to get the most votes in Lagos State away from the established political class and defeated Tinubu in his stronghold.

Nigeria is currently facing enormous challenges: inflation in Africa’s largest economy and main oil producer is running in the double digits. In addition, there is brutal violence in the northeast of the country, where jihadists have been fighting for their own state for 14 years and terrorize the population with kidnappings and attacks. According to UN figures, the conflict has killed more than 40,000 people since 2009 and displaced about two million people.

(AFP)

Source: Blick