By Azubuike Ishiekwene
With only hours before Nigeria’s rescheduled general elections are due to begin, Saturday’s presidential poll will not only be a verdict on the two main candidates – incumbent, Goodluck Jonathan and challenger, General Muhammadu Buhari.
The poll will also be a referendum on the most influential power blocs, the presumed kingmakers in Africa’s most populous country:
1. Corporate Nigeria: Although government dominates Nigeria’s economy, with crude oil accounting for nearly 90 percent of the country’s income, the private sector is playing an increasing role in the economy and politics. Currently, the service sector, mainly private sector driven, contributes to 30 percent of GDP. The business tycoons who drive this sector are largely from the banks and financial services, telecommunications, entertainment, and construction. They are no longer shy to put their money where their mouth is. A fundraiser by the ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in December targeting the group raked in $96 million, breaching the campaign funding limit. Although Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote was not present at the December event, he has attended at least one or two Jonathan fundraisers since, keeping his pledge close to his chest. The rival All Progressives Congress (APC) has tried to engage the business community, but the heavyweights appear reluctant to step up to the plate. “I think the rich have an unspoken anxiety about how to handle Buhari. They think he might plug many of the loopholes that make doing business, especially dodgy business, easier for them. Of course, they have suffered losses under Jonathan, especially in the last few months since the naira took a 20 percent slide. But it’s a case of the devil you know,” said Maxwell Ojobo, a business consultant.
2. Retired Generals: The humiliation suffered by the Nigerian military at the hands of Boko Haram appears to have turned a large chunk of this group against Jonathan. The most active cell of retired generals led by three former President Olusegun Obasanjo, Ibrahim Babangida, and Abdulsalami Abubakar are opposed, or at best lukewarm, to a second term for Jonathan. Obasanjo has been quite vocal. He recently supervised the tearing up his PDP membership card publicly, accusing Jonathan of corruption and incompetence. Despite talk of longstanding suspicion and animosity among the old soldiers, a shared concern is that another four years of Jonathan could irretrievably rob the military of what is left of its pride and push the country to the brink of another civil war.
3. State governors: “In the last four elections since 1999, they often wrote the results, regardless of the vote, with help from the security and law enforcement agents,” said Akanni Aderemi, a former lecturer. The crisis in the PDP and the merger of four parties to form the APC has eroded the number of states controlled by the ruling party from 24 to 20 (APC controls 14). It has also sort of leveled the “balance of terror.” With the rallying cry by the opposition to voters to “protect their votes,” and the widespread use of technology both by the electoral commission and ordinary voters, governors may find themselves playing a diminished role in Saturday’s poll. “Never say never,” Akanni said. “The presidential election comes first and the result will significantly affect the outcome of the governorship election, which comes up two weeks later. The governors will throw in everything. Remember, too, that they still have tons of cash at their disposal. In this election, money could also be a game changer.”
4. Clergy: Nigerians wear religion on their sleeves and on their car bumpers. Politicians exploit the gap in-between. The roughly 50-50 split between the country’s Muslim and Christian populations has ensured that religion remains a flashpoint in life and politics. Rotimi Amaechi, the governor of one of Nigeria’s richest oil states in the south and APC campaign director, accused the ruling party of shelling out $27.5 million to bribe the Christian clergy. Even though PDP has denied the allegation, the candidates of both major parties virtually “converted” to church rats, ticking off one “anointing service” after another. The general overseer of one of The Redeemed Christian Church of God, one of the largest Pentecostal churches in Nigeria told his congregation to get their voting cards as “a must.” Professor Yemi Osinbajo, Buhari’s running mate, is a pastor in this church. Not to be outdone, Muslim religious leaders, especially in the north, have also been rallying the faithful to make their voices heard on Saturday.
5. Trade unions: Nigeria Labour Congress, the country’s main trade union, is on crutches. An election last week that was supposed to produce a new executive ended in chaos, producing two rival factions, each one sympathetic to one of the two major political parties. Inside this divided house, however, there are multiple corners of loyalties. The national students association, for example, has declared its support for Jonathan, as has a faction of the influential union of road transport workers and the Labour Party. But the elite professional unions including bank, oil industry workers and electricity, textile, and teachers’ unions appear to have pitched their tent with the opposition. The unions may disagree on many things, but one thing they agree on is, divided they stand.
6. Traditional rulers: In the last few weeks, the palaces of traditional rulers across the country have been mecca of sorts. Two weeks ago, Jonathan visited over 14 traditional rulers in the southwest, considered the battleground in Saturday’s election. In a lead story, Sunday PUNCH, a local newspaper, reported that Jonathan brought down “showers of dollar rain,” in the palaces of the traditional rulers during his visit. Buhari’s visits to traditional rulers have been less controversial. He is known to have had frequent run-ins with them when he was military head of state. After one recent palace visit, Buhari was reported to have told an aide, “I know many of them don’t like me. The problem is that they cannot ignore the groundswell of support for me by ordinary people just outside their palace gates.”
7. The Media: If the vote depended on the mainstream media, the result would be inconclusive. Government-controlled media at federal and state levels have been at their craven best, blocking off the voices of parties other than those of the government in power. The partisanship has spilled into the private press, where media owners line up behind candidates in one party and yet squabble over political advert budget from both sides estimated at over $60 million. The director of the media watchdog, Media Rights Agenda, Edetaen Ojo, said, “Mainstream media is a very diverse landscape. Having said that, it is clear that many otherwise respectable outlets within the mainstream media in Nigeria have exhibited very dangerous biases in their coverage of the electoral process and the political campaigns. In this respect, they have been only a notch better than social media platforms. The coverage of the present campaigns has been the worst performance by the media in the coverage of electoral processes since the return to electoral democracy in Nigeria in 1999.”
As one journalist put it, “the kingmakers may make the king, but from what we have seen so far, who can deny that the money makes the kingmakers?”
Azubuike Ishiekwene was the Group Managing director of the Abuja-based LEADERSHIP newspaper. He is a board member of the Global Editors Network and World Policy Journal.
[Photos courtesy of achapunneka and midesowunmi]