Ekiti Gov Election And Vote Buying

By Ayodele Oni

After months of political activities preparatory to the Governorship election in Ekiti State, a winner eventually emerged early Sunday morning.

According to the results declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), Biodun Oyebanji, candidate of the All Progressive Congress, (APC) won the poll.

The results indicate that Oyebanji won in 15 out of the 16 Local Governments scoring 187,057 votes. Segun Oni of the Social Democratic Party, (SDP) came a distant second with 82211, while Bisi Kolawole, flagbearer of Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) is third with 57,457 votes.The  only female candidate, Kemi Elebute – Halle of ADP got 3,495 votes.

In all, 16 political parties fielded candidates for the election, according to the record of Independent National Electoral Commission, ( INEC) and voters registration stood at 749,065.

Reports from the field indicate that the poll was peaceful, devoid of any serious security breach despite pre- election tension which enveloped the State following bloody clashes among supporters of the candidates.

Deaths were recorded before the election, but it was another story on Saturday, 18th, as voters trooped out, queued and waited for their turn to vote for candidate of their choice in a peaceful serene.

Some have attributed this to a peace accord signed by the candidates before the election to be of good conduct and the presence of Security Personnel including Soldiers, Regular Police, Mobile Force, Civil Defence and State Security Personnel.

INEC has scored itself a pass mark on the Ekiti election as virtually all equipment and materials it deployed functioned perfectly and up till now, none of its officials has been accused of any form of malpractice.

But another major aspect of the election, which is fast becoming part and parcel of Nigeria’s election process is vote buying. This is usually done by agents of candidates at the voting point, to induce voters to vote for candidate of their choice.

There is no denying the fact that voters were heavily induced during the just concluded Ekiti election. Despite the presence of EFCC officials, the story is still the same. All participating political parties were guilty of this, they only out-played one  another.

Inducements ranging between N5k and N20k were given to voters to curry their favour. Investigation reveals that virually all those that voted during the election were induced, some done with security agencies watching the receiver and taker.

Except in some cases, which were reported in some areas within the state capital when EFCC officials arrested some of those involved in the vote buying deal.

Experience of some Observers also indicates that the election was marred by vote-buying, which saw the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, (EFCC), and Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, (NSCDC), arresting two people including a chieftain of the PDP in Ado Ekiti, following alleged attempts to induce voters and cause violence.

A mild drama was reported at the Ado Ekiti, Ijigbo Ward 004, Unit 001 as some voters complained bitterly that an APC agent failed to give out money promised them before voting for their candidate.

Some women were heard complaining about how the APC agent declined to settle them after voting for the party’s candidate.

One of them was heard saying: “We will disappoint them in the presidential election; they think they are wise to have played us. They successfully tricked us into voting their party. No wahala.

“In the morning, PDP and SDP shared N5,000 each to their persons, but here we are hoping to get N10,000 from APC but ended up disappointed.”

Aside vote-buying, two men were arrested in Ise-Orùn for allegedly disrupting election in one of the Wards and snatching ballot boxes.

According to eyewitnesses, the two men shot sporadically at Odo-Moba Ward 1 Unit 4, forcing voters to flee before snatching the ballot boxes.

They were, however, caught by men of the Nigeria Army while attempting to escape.

The Centre for Democracy and Development, (CDD), in its report said its Field Observers documented 41 instances of vote-buying and selling at polling units across six Local Government Areas (LGAs) during the governorship election.

According to the Civil Society Group, the cases were recorded at Ado-Ekiti, Ijero, Ikole Irepodun/Ifelodun, Ise/Orun and Moba LGAs of Ekiti.

The hairman of CDD’s Election Analysis Centre (EAC), Prof. Adele Jinadu, revealed the development at a preliminary briefing of Journalists in Abuja on the conduct of the governorship election.

According to him, vote-buying took the patterns of cash collection in brown envelopes to disguise the content in order to avoid arrest by anti-corruption agencies.

The CDD-EAC Chair stated that, in some cases, some young voters openly displayed the money, explaining that the universities’  strike influenced some of them to perceive the election as an opportunity to solve their economic challenges.

He said, “CDD-EAC observers documented 41 instances of vote buying and selling at polling units. Observer data showed incidents of vote-buying and selling in LGAs like Ado-Ekiti, Ijero, Ikole Irepodun/Ifelodun, Ise/Orun and Moba.

“One of the observable patterns of vote buying was the collection of cash in brown envelopes, which was apparently meant to disguise the content of the envelopes in order to avoid arrest by the anti-corruption agencies.”

While stating that the general atmosphere of the election was peaceful, the CDD noted that the conduct of the poll by the INEC showed some progress in terms of the administration.

It, however, added that there remained several areas of concerns, which call for stronger management of elections.

Although, the voting was largely peaceful, the new trend of vote-buying called ‘See and Buy’ where voters had to evolve ways of showing their thumb-printed ballots to party agents or chieftains nearly marred the exercise in some parts of Ekiti.

Following separate attempts to induce voters and cause violence, the NSCDC arrested two people in Ado-Ekiti.

The Director, Public Relations at the Corps’ National Headquarters, DCC Olusola Odumosu, in a preliminary statement, said: “Two persons were been arrested in Ado Local Government; one in connection with vote-buying while the other was arrested in connection with thuggery to disrupt voting at a polling unit.”

Similarly, Operatives of the EFCC arrested a stalwart of the PDP for allegedly inducing voters at Ola Oluwa Muslim Secondary School, Ado Ekiti, during the Governorship election. The party chieftain was arrested with a large sum of money.

The party agent at the Polling Unit, Babajide Adebayo, who confirmed the incident, said: “When EFCC people came, somebody pointed at the PDP chieftain who was standing alone.

“There was nobody with him, he was not talking to anybody or given money to anybody, he was arrested and whisked away. The PDP stalwart is an engineer, he came to work in Ekiti but I have made calls to tell our leaders about the arrest.”

EFCC operatives were seen in large numbers in some polling units where some major parties were alleged to have engaged in vote-buying.

In its first reaction to the outcome of the election, Segun Oni Campaign Organisaton, rejected the outcome of Saturday’s Governorship election saying it is unacceptable.

Spokesman of the campaign organization, Mr Moses Jolayemi, accused the APC of engaging in vote buying.

He also accused security agencies of compromise during the election.

Besides, he said the SDP candidate will not concede defeat saying the party will meet to take necessary steps.