I remember the 1983 election vividly and I am seeing some similarities in the reaction of the opposition today. Those of us supporting UPN were already celebrating the victory of Chief Awolowo when out of nowhere results started shifting to favor the NPN incumbent Pres. Shagari.
We cried rigging when NPN's victory was declared. It was years later that I understood what had happened. Forgive me but back then I was a very young teenager who could barely see issues beyond the 6 ft radius of my immediate surrounding.
It turned out that the early results announced after the election favored Chief Awolowo because they were mainly the SW states of Lagos, Ogun, Oyo, and Ondo states. Back then we only had 19 states in Nigeria and the current South East only had two States Anambra and Imo.
Was the election rigged? Of course but at that time, politicians rig in their stronghold, or maybe I should say until recently, that used to be the norm.
As the results trickled in from the Northern parts of the country, Shagari's NPN overcame the deficit in the South by a huge margin courtesy of what is now known as the KKK states. The party even won the state of Oyo in the SW (Akintola angle).
NPN also won the governorship election in Oyo and Ondo states. The loss of the governorship elections by the UPN actually resulted in the riots that engulfed Oyo and Ondo states after the election resulting in the death of scores of our citizens.
Now that you understand 1983, you can now see the link between the two periods. An early favorable election result at the base of a party or politician does not lead to victory in the general election. This should make sense but when emotion rules logic, logic takes a back seat.
What is however sad is that Prof Utomi and other (not all) Obi supporters nationwide are deliberately framing the next president of Nigeria, whoever that is, as an illegitimate leader. This is one of the reasons progress in Nigeria is difficult.
When the people who should understand mob mentality join the mob, the end result can be unpredictable. But one thing is sure, the mob acts on emotion rather than reasoning so the day their enablers decide to speak the truth is the day they will end in the belly of the mob.
The loss of the election by the Labour party is not due to any rigging but rather due to a lack of good strategy. A party that focuses mainly on attracting people from only one section of the country is repeating the mistake of the UPN and the NPP.
Appealing to sectional or religious sentiment alone won't win a national election in Nigeria.
The fact that the labor party earned votes in all the zones does not negate the assertion that it is a sectional party. The result coming out of the South East is proof of my argument. How else does a candidate win 100% of votes in almost every polling unit?
The South East politicians have been given an opportunity to build a national party around LP or PDP. How they use this is up to them. I hope the APC members in that zone can learn from this to build a better ground game next time.
@MichaelPepple_T I get to decide what I write about and you should do the same thing with your time. My keyboard. My time. My choice of topic.
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