Public Affairs Analyst

Coming on the heels of the INEC February 6 and 7, 2011 publication of the official list of candidates for the general elections in April is the kick-starting of open campaign. Section 99 (1) of the Electoral Act 2010 says “...the period of campaigning in public by every political party shall commence 90 days before the polling day and end 24 hours prior to that day”. As it is, the April General Elections is less than two months away. Thus, it is that season again when politicians will be mounting the soapbox to tell us what they intend to do for their constituents, if voted into power. Indeed, People’s Democratic Party on Monday, February 7 flagged off its campaign at Lafia, Nassarawa State. Campaign promises has become hollow ritual in Nigeria as it is full of platitudes; so much building of castles in the air. It does seem that in the 88 years of our history of electoral democracy (since 1923), it has been same promises of provision of dividends of democracy. How many times over ha...

Finally, the wheat has been separated from the chaff, the men from the boys, the contenders from the pretenders. It was battle royale, a nerve wracking game of intrigues, eventually by fair or foul means the 63 registered political parties have nominated their flag-bearers and by close of business on Monday, January 31, 2011, only 44 or thereabout of the lot were able to beat the deadline for submission of the names of their candidates for the April 2011 General Elections. It is yet unknown if the 19 political parties who did not submit list of their candidates to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as at when due decided of their own volition not to field candidates for the April polls or they were negligent with time, thinking that it will be business as usual when INEC’s time-table could be treated with disdain. An evaluation of the party congresses, conventions and primaries held between INEC stipulated time of November 26, 2010 and January 15, 2011 shows that Nige...

Preparation for the fourth successive elections since Nigeria’s return to civil rule in 1999 is in top gear. In recent weeks, particularly from November 26, 2010 to January 15, 2011 all the 63 registered political parties in Nigeria have taken turns to organise their party congresses and conventions for the nomination of their candidates. In the process of organising these party primaries, political observers have witnessed two major incidents. First is the mind-blowing spending spree by the aspirants and their political parties. Second, there was also an unprecedented incident of electoral violence be it physical, psychological or structural. This piece is an attempt to establish the nexus between campaign finance and electoral violence. As this is a season of high wire politics, it is therefore not surprising that those competing for positions at the general elections in April 2011 jostled to out-spend one another in order to get nominated as flag bearers of their political parties. ...