How The Winner Of The Anambra State Nov 18, Governorship Election Would Emerge, By Anayo Nwosu

By Anayo M. Nwosu

The principal actors in the Anambra governorship elections are presently engaged in a game of chess, each planning on how to outdo the other in the game few of them have mastered and in which only one of them will be the winner.


To an innocent observer, the registered voters in Anambra State will decide the winner.

What a wrong assumption!

There are other deciding factors.

Voters alone don’t determine the outcome of elections in Anambra State and in most other states in the southeast. Other factors do.

A popular candidate that ignores the victory determinants does so to his own peril; just as Peter Obi was to find out in 2003 when he was robbed of his victory.

The candidate who has on his side, the state police commissioner, the police area commanders, the DPOs, the army and the majority of the presiding electoral officers and the INEC resident electoral commissioner will be announced the winner.

All it takes is to set money aside or to get someone so high up in Abuja to give “orders from above” to those charged with election conduct to work with an anointed candidate and the rest would be what is locally referred to as an “akamu case”.

A compromised REC or state electoral commissioner who is in charge of distribution of voting materials knows what to do. That’s where the rigging begins.

He would ensure that voting materials do not get on time to the locations considered the main support bases of the most popular candidate or that card readers don’t function. These would frustrate the voters who will leave the pooling booths without casting their votes.

Anambra people are impatient and don’t waste time at polling booths.

Well “motivated” presiding officers could alter original entries of the actual votes cast even though this may be reversed in the court. Note that the primary objective is to ensure that the preferred candidate is announced the winner at all cost.

The court might reverse the announced result but that could take many months to happen if at all evidence are still left untampered with.

The settled security personnel help the preferred candidate by closing their eyes to illegal movements of the thugs or election rigging machinery of the anointed candidate while demobilizing those of his opponents.

The “licensed” thugs usually would go around undisturbed on Election Day to cause confusion at the polling booths in the strongholds of their opponents to achieve a massive cancellation of votes that would have made a difference due to violence.

There are always, dedicated secret result cooking areas, usually in the highly protected private houses of the top party men where ballot papers are thumb-printed by paid agents, the results of which are smuggled into collation centers under war like circumstances.

To give credibility to the entire election, few voting centers in the state capital, Onitsha and Nnewi would be shown on the TV as being orderly and smooth. These include the polling booths close to the houses of contestants where they normally cast their votes.

Journalists are usually barred from the hot zones where election results are to be manipulated. Daredevil pressmen would be beaten and their equipment seized.

However, the invention of camera phones has helped the world and observers at large behold some of those atrocious deeds of our politicians in a bid to win election.

If only they would agree to disclose, the security agents or INEC officials posted to work during Anambra elections, have their stars to thank. Money, money and more money!

An officer could either be paid to help in rigging efforts or to remain neutral. Some end up becoming neutral if they are promised lynching by vigilant voters.

What other reason other than to scatter an evil arrangement do the higher authorities like INEC Chairman or IGP re-shuffle the command and control of election office few hours before an election?

Some politicians still have enough money to engage the newly posted officers who are expected to be impartial. It is one of the hottest horse trading with unpredictable outcomes.

Good politicians also gift election officers some money out of sheer generosity. It is called “thank you for coming”.

Assuming that the INEC and the security agencies decide to remain largely neutral, the game will shift to the polling booths.

Some party officers and vote canvassers leave the campaigns for the last day and at the voting center. They would bargain with voters on how much they would collect to vote for their preferred candidates. The prices range from N1,000 to N5,000.

The voter would thumbprint, raise the ballot paper up for an eagle-eyed agent to see who he or she voted for before folding the paper and inserting into the box. The agent would then signal the paymaster in a nearby car to pay the delivered voter as agreed.

In this trade, most parties are represented and the highest bidder carries the day.

When a very rich and influential politician promises to deliver his constituency to his party, paying for votes is one of his game plans; that’s if he fails to get the support of INEC and security agencies to write the results in his house, hotel or factory.

The Nov 18 election is clearly between the APC and APGA.

Tony Nwoye’s APC could easily get the support of the federal government’s apparatuses to get announced as the winner.

However, Gov. Willie could neutralize the effectiveness of the federal might by “motivating” the federal officials to be neutral. Imagine being paid not to commit an electoral offense?

There will be an uneven match in bribe for votes in the 119 communities and town in Anambra State come this November. APC would try but shall be outspent by APGA as the FG has not shown its willingness to fund its candidate through NNPC contracts as PDP would when it was in power at the centre.

Expectedly, PDP’s Obaze wouldn’t condescend to banal politics as is currently played. His sojourn in the United Nations and his high degree of ethics have combined to make him an outsider to Anambra politics.

Obaze’s mentor, Peter Obi would not bribe anybody especially the voters they want to redeem. Sadly, the voters would not listen to them on the Election Day. That’s why the problem lies.

The handsome and brilliant Chidoka who has great plans would not win as much votes as he ought to have won due to his lack of deep pocket, his insistence on violating the zoning formula and his running on a new party with no structures in the state. His Biafra leaning is yet to translate to electoral capital.

If the elections is conducted in a free and fair manner, Gov Willie Obiano will win enough votes to retain his seat but overconfidence would be his greatest undoing.

Gov. Willie Obiano practically oils and owns the structure of the 119 town unions and the vigilante groups that have their central commander in Awka. He could use them to neutralize local thugs that would attempt to export violence to voting venues.

Obiano could also use some of the local vigilantes as poll watchers to ensure that physical obstructions and human resistance are given when election rogues decide to swap results sheets or snatch ballot boxes.

The civil servants will repay Obiano on Nov 18 for caring for them. He even promoted and increased salaries when most states owe workers.

Obiano will also get the votes of more than 60% of Catholics who constitute more than 67% of the voters in Anambra State.

Obiano, like Obi, has had a good working relationship with Onitsha, Nnewi and Awka catholic bishops as well as their Anglican counterparts.

Candidates Ezeemo, Chidoka of UPP and Nwoye of APC will share the Anglican votes.

In their own self-enlightened interest, many powerful politicians from Anambra South zone, with eyes on Agu Awka Govt. House, are openly or tacitly supporting Obiano to do another four years after which it will be the turn of their zone to produce the next governor.

There are no guarantees that Tony Nwoye and Oseloka Obaze, who are from the northern part of Anambra as Gov. Obiano, would do a single term if they win.

From where I’m standing, I see Gov Willie Obiano retaining his seat come Nov 18, 2017.