Elder statesman and former civilian governor of old Kaduna State, Alhaji Balarabe Musa has stated that the recent victory of Gen. Muhammadu Buhari in the March 28 presidential election lacks a popular mandate.
According to him, it is unfortunate that out of 70 million registered voters; only 28 million Nigerians participated actively in the election.
This, he noted could not be said to amount to a popular mandate.
The politician who is the national chairman of the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP), said the election victory was only accepted for peace to reign in the country.
He said that the last general elections could not be tagged as free and fair because the exercise was characterized by money power and outright arrogance by political players.
According to him, “Let me advise Buhari that he should just form a government of national unity because he did not have a popular mandate, he has a mandate, but it is not a popular one. Let him bring on board all the political parties and form a government of national unity.
“Many Nigerians were disfranchised, they were so afraid to come out to vote because of the perceived looming violence, so we cannot say that the president-elect has a popular mandate in the election.
“Just look at it this way, out of 70 million registered Nigerians voters, only 28 million Nigerians voted for both the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and All Progressives Congress (APC). This is not a popular mandate.
“The election was not a qualitative change; it has both negative and positive features, so much so that no one knows why we are in this situation.
“It is not possible to have free, fair and transparent election in future, leading to legitimate government because we are still playing money bags politics in this country. There is no condition on ground to guarantee free and fair election for a very long time to come. This is the basic truth.
“The deciding factor in our election and politic is money power, and this is not good for the future of our democracy. But it is better that we had an election than not having it at all.
“If the election had been postponed again, nobody would have known where Nigeria would have been by now because there would have been series of fighting in the country. But we thank God the election came and went peacefully.
“However, one good thing about the election is that in spite of anxiety and expectation that Nigeria would disintegrate during the election, it did not disintegrate, rather it was peaceful. Aside this, we are yet to get it right in terms of free and fair election”.
