[dropcap]Ev[/dropcap]ery right-thinking Nigerian knows Muhammadu Buhari did not win the 2019 presidential election. Nevertheless, at the very least, some 10 million Nigerians must have voted genuinely for him. In view of the extent to which the situation in Nigeria has deteriorated dramatically over the few months since the election, we need to ask the president’s supporters if they don’t now regret voting for him. Is the Nigeria of today really the Nigeria they voted for?
It is not now abundantly clear that a vote for Buhari was a vote for conflict, crisis and confusion? Did is supporters realise that they were voting for the disintegration of the national fabric that we are now witnessing? Did they not know that in voting for Buhari, they were voting for the war drums that are now beating all over Nigeria? Should they have voted for the stand-still, the go-slow, the no-government we have experienced since February 2019?
Since the election, the government has come up with only two policies, both of them counter-productive. The one is the establishment of an illegal Fulani Radio Station, which has heightened suspicions that the government has a Fulanisation agenda. The other is RUGA; a policy widely regarded as a cynical attempt to colonise the country with the Fulani by the establishment of cattle ranches nationwide.
Meanwhile, Mrs. Fasoranti-Olakurin, the daughter of the Afenifere leader has been slaughtered in cold blood by Fulani herdsmen. Fearing reprisals, the Northern Elders Forum asked all Fulanis to return back home to the North. Expatriate workers have been kidnapped in Kwara. A bloodbath has taken place in Sokoto. Zamfara is now a no-go no-government area, The Shiites have rioted in Abuja. There is a civil war going on in the APC over ministerial appointments. All this, and the so-called new government is less than two months’ old.
[pull_quote_center]The 2019 presidential election was essentially between two Fulani men. But the incendiary of Fulanisation only pertains to one of them: President Muhammadu Buhari.[/pull_quote_center]
Death knell
Even the blind can now see that Nigeria is on the rocks. The future of our union is now seriously in doubt. Many are preparing for war, and all because of the actions and inactions of one man: President Muhammadu Buhari.
The 2019 presidential election was essentially between two Fulani men. But the incendiary of Fulanisation only pertains to one of them: President Muhammadu Buhari.
It is therefore pertinent to ask: “Who bewitched the Nigerians that decided to renew Buhari’s mandate?” It was not as if the president is an unknown quantity. He has been around for over 40 years and has not changed in any material particular.
Bola Tinubu is one of Buhari’s South-west allies. But this is what he had to say about the same Buhari in 2003: “Muhammadu Buhari is an agent of destabilization, ethnic bigot and religious fanatic who if given the chance would ensure the disintegration of the country. His ethnocentrism would jeopardize Nigeria’s national unity.”
How many non-Fulani Nigerians would contest this assertion today? What then is Tinubu doing with Buhari?
The state of the Nigerian union today is eloquent testimony that Buhari could not have won the February presidential election. This is not the context in which an incumbent president wins re-election. This is the context in which an incumbent president is disgraced out of office.
Failed state
The Nigeria of Buhari is a failed state. In four years, the president has succeeded in dividing the country across every possible fissure. The Shiites are up in arms against Sunni Muslims. The Boko Haram is engaged in an internecine war against the North-east. The Igbo are yearning for Biafra. The Fulani herdsmen have declared war against the Middle Belt and the South. Christians are systematically butchered and churches destroyed in the North.
Lamented General Yakubu Gowon (rtd.), a former president of Nigeria who had to fight a civil war as president: “I am sad and worried at the religious dimension the killings is assuming, the authorities should redouble their effort to deal with the security situation because if that is not done, the country could descend into a religious war, with no one coming out victorious.”
What were you thinking voting for Buhari? Thanks to him, the Nigerian economy is in tatters. Farming is hazardous with herdsmen on the rampage. Travel by road is now dangerous, with kidnappers on the loose. The government has returned Nigeria to high debtor status, from which we were redeemed by the PDP. There are no jobs, no electricity and no money.
According to UNDP, no less than 51% of Nigeria’s 200 million population is now hungry poor. Law and order has broken down. Innocent Nigerians are being killed on a daily basis by herdsmen and bandits without government reprieve. I repeat: “What were you thinking voting for Buhari?”
Extra-judicial killings
The government itself is not averse to butchering Nigerians. Said Osai Ojigho, Director of Amnesty International, Nigeria: “We have seen a shocking and unconscionable use of deadly force by soldiers and police against (Shiite) members. Video footage and eyewitness testimonies consistently show that the Nigerian military dispersed peaceful gatherings by firing live ammunition without warning, in clear violation of Nigerian and international law.”
“Those injured were shot in different parts of the body – head, neck, back, chest, shoulder, legs, arms – and some of them had multiple gunshot wounds. This pattern clearly shows soldiers and police approached (Shiite) processions not to restore public order, but to kill. It seems the Nigerian military are deliberately using tactics designed to kill when dealing with (Shiite) gatherings. Many of these shootings clearly amount to extra-judicial executions.”
Fulanisation has now entered fully into the lexicon of Nigerians, as the government seems determined to “ruganise” the country against the will of the people. Drums of war are being beaten here and there. The country is rudderless and leaderless. No one seems to know who exactly is in charge.
Stolen mandate
In the meantime, a major drama being played out in the election tribunals which offers, for now, Nigeria’s only hope for reprieve. Atiku Abubakar, the winner of the last presidential election, is striving to retrieve his stolen mandate. He has placed all his hopes in the judiciary, as he should.
We all know the election was massively rigged. But the challenge is whether Atiku can convince the eminent members of the Nigerian judiciary beyond reasonable doubt that, as far as the rigging of elections in Nigeria is concerned, the February 2019 case is “a bridge too far?”
The evidence suggests that he has. In the first instance, it is now abundantly clear that Buhari is not even qualified to be president of Nigeria. If justice were to be served, President Buhari would not end up in Aso Rock. He would end up in Kirikiri prisons.
The president stands accused of perjury. He swore an oath and made an affidavit to INEC claiming he attended Elementary School Daura and Mai Aduaa between 1948 and 1952. However, those schools were not in even existence between 1948 and 1952. How then could Buhari have been in attendance there?
Buhari also swore on oath that he attended Middle School Katsina between 1953 and 1956. But again, the Middle School was again not in existence as at 1953 and up till 1956. Finally, Buhari swore on oath that he attended Katsina Provincial College between 1956 and 1961. However, Katsina Provincial College was neither built, founded or even in existence between 1956 and 1961.
All this makes our dear president a serial perjurer; an offence punishable by 14 years’ imprisonment. It also renders him disqualified as a presidential candidate, ensuring that he is not even entitled to be credited with any votes whatsoever.
INEC server
A key bone of contention is whether the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) transmitted the results of the election from smart card readers to a central server. Atiku claims it did, and has the proofs to back this up.
According to the INEC back-end server, Atiku was the actual winner of the election. The data from the server shows Atiku actually polled a total of 18,356,732 votes; while President Muhammadu Buhari only secured 16,741,430 votes. However, this is completely different from what INEC announced publicly. According to INEC, Buhari won with 15,191,847 votes while Atiku only polled 11,262,978 votes.
INEC insists it did not transmit any votes to an electronic back server but only used manual collation. However, a leaked INEC memo has further corroborated Atiku’s claim that INEC did transmit the results of the election to an electronic central server.
Dated 25th March, 2019 and signed by the Secretary to INEC, Rose Oriaran-Anthony, the memo directed all INEC resident electoral commissioners (RECs) to report to the commission the challenges they faced during the election, including problems with transmitting voter accreditation to a central server.
Indeed, the INEC training manual for ad-hoc staff prior to the elections required that Presiding Officers at the polls should: “send the number of voters verified from Smart Card Reader to INEC back end server.” Different INEC officers who worked during the election have come forward to state categorically that the results of the 2019 presidential election were transmitted electronically to a central server.
Election rigmarole
Atiku has shown conclusively how APC thugs, in cahoots with security agents chased PDP agents away to enable unfettered manipulation of the results. As a result, many of the result sheets were mutilated and cancelled in the bid to ensure that fabricated results from the polling units corresponded to the records at the wards.
Imo Ugochinyere, national spokesman for the Coalition of United Political Parties in Nigeria described the 2019 presidential election as a “pyrrhic victory and the robbery of a nation.”
“In the glare of the whole world, the government killed its own citizens, cancelled results particularly in areas of strength of the opposition, inflated scores recorded particularly in areas of strength of the president, burnt INEC offices in areas where it was not sure of victory, raided opposition leaders’ homes and officers, (and) compromised INEC and security officials, because of the desperation of a non-performing president to hold on to power.”
In many cases, the number of votes declared in the results by INEC far exceeded the number of accredited voters. Attempts were then made by the state collation officers to reconcile this by simply working the figures to the answers. Some reported that authentic results were torn publicly by APC agents in the presence of INEC officials.
Therefore, in many instances, PDP agents refused to sign the result sheets as required by law. Many even claimed the Form EC8A were not even presented to them for verification and authentication. Moreover, the evidence now indicates that no election whatsoever was held in Zamfara. The results were simply fabricated.
Femi Aribisala is an iconoclastic church pastor in Lagos. He is also a syndicated essayist for a handful publications in Nigeria. Connect with him on Twitter at @FemiAribisala and at his website, www.femiaribisala.com.
The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author.
