THE Osun State governorship election was concluded after two rounds of voting, the first widely regarded as very credible but stalemated, and the second decisive but thought to be a little controversial. Yet, it was the second round of voting, the rerun in seven polling units, that determined the outcome of the poll. Because the second round saw some pushing and shoving, not many analysts were persuaded to repose absolute confidence in their own observations and conclusions. However, on the whole, given the statistical presentation of the election, the outcome appears in large measure to be a true reflection of both the wishes of the electorate and their opinions of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and the opposition challenger, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Some other analysts may even go further to extrapolate a third aspect of the vote to predict the 2019 presidential election.
First the statistics. Some 1.68m Osun residents registered to vote. About 1.25 of them collected their PVCs. But for one reason or the other more than 500,000 of them did not vote. Out of the about 721,607 who voted validly in both the main and supplementary elections, some 35.41 percent voted for the APC, while about 35.34 percent voted the PDP. It was indeed a nail-biting finish, but one which largely reflected popular will, contrary to the feeling of dissenters. It is indeed very significant that the turnout in both the main and supplementary elections, which could not be rigged ahead of the polls, was 42.89 percent and 42.45 percent respectively. In other words, despite allegations of disenfranchisement and violence, the rerun poll witnessed only a marginal, insignificant drop in turnout.
Whoever won the poll between APC’s Gboyega Oyetola and Ademola Adeleke would still have needed to moderate his celebration. Not only was the turnout less than 50 percent, though a fair figure when juxtaposed with the turnout during national elections, it is even more humbling when considered against the total number of registered voters and the estimated population of the state. The winner, APC’s Mr Oyetola, persuaded only 15.19 percent of the registered voters, and a miserly 5.11 percent of the state’s estimated population of about five million. (There are no reliable population figures for Nigeria, let alone the state. In 2006, Osun was about 3.4m, and should be more than five million now). With such appalling ratios, it is important for the winner to circumscribe his victory dance despite the euphoria that accompanied his success. His mandate is severely limited both by the smallness of the turnout and by the almost indistinguishable closeness to his challenger’s figure.
That either the APC or the PDP could have won the poll is a testament to the crazy division bifurcating Osun and the indisputable inability of the outgoing governor to engender a lasting and memorable impact on the state. They indicate that Governor Rauf Aregbesola’s policies, and possibly his style, were quite limiting, controversial, divisive and generally poorly conceived and executed. He and his supporters view his road and school building projects as imperishable legacies. To some extent they are right. He will doubtless be remembered for the many significant projects he undertook in his eight years in office. But considering how he sometimes neutralised his lofty projects by his serial indiscretions — projects at the cost of the people’s welfare, projects at the cost of sound public finance, model schools subverted by renaming and needless mergers, etc — it is not altogether clear that he would have the kind of fame he yearns for.
Indeed, more than any other factor, Mr Aregbesola nearly lost the election for the APC. They won only by the skin of their teeth. It is suggested that the zoning controversy was an important factor in the closeness of the election outcome, and that imposition was also a critical factor, with Mr Oyetola thought in addition to be lacking in charisma. Perhaps there is some truths in these arguments. But not only did the PDP conspire to make Mr Oyetola’s presumed lack of charisma of no effect whatsoever by their election of the frivolous Mr Adeleke as their candidate, they also managed in the same breath to make the zoning issue of less significance. Instead of focusing on the APC’s rupture of the unwritten zoning arrangement, voters were torn between embracing the more level-headed and thoughtful Mr Oyetola and electing the rotund and passionate dancer who has not offered any coherent idea on any subject, including dancing and drama. No people were ever so poised on the horns of dilemma as the Osun electorate last week. In the end, they stilled their conscience and held their nose and voted, not according to their conscience as it is customarily said, but according to the momentary vacillations of their vexed souls.
The matter of imposition is a bit more complex. But it is often a flimsy argument. Mr Oyetola is a native of Osun, and he has backers from near and far. He is entitled to his friends. He did not appear to have been imposed on his party when the APC held an incontrovertible direct primary. More importantly, it was inconceivable that he could have been imposed on the people in a statewide election. A study of elections worldwide shows clearly how in some cases friends, families and business partners support one another in local and national elections. If a candidate gets the sponsorship of a big donor, regardless of the preconceived notions about the donor, it is hard to imagine how that amounts to imposition. If a candidate or aspirant is not supported by a big sponsor, he will be supported by a powerful group. If he is not supported by either, he will have to rely on creating a mass movement of voters and angry citizens frustrated by the status quo.
What in fact made the Osun election to be so uncomfortably close and even controversial was largely Mr Aregbesola. He came into office, not just by a remarkable legal legerdemain, as cynics suggest, but by a popular coalition eager to welcome giant developmental efforts. That coalition saw Mr Argbesola take Ijeshaland in 2011 and significantly too in 2014 by a huge plurality. The Ijesha dominate the civil service and teaching profession. The lack of regular salary payment was bound to affect them and their pensioners more than any other group. The governor’s poor handling of public finance and the chasm which that created between public projects and people’s welfare and well-being were bound to win him enemies. Had the APC taken just one thousand more votes in last week’s poll from Ijeshaland, which would still be considerably less than the margin he took in 2014, there would have been no rerun, let alone a controversy that has raised doubts in the minds of many who argue that the election was stolen.
Not only did the APC take about 140,000 fewer votes in 2018 than it took in 2014, it lost Atakumosa West, lost Obokun, lost Oriade, lost Ilesha West, managed to win Ilesha East, but won Atakumosa East fairly well. In 2014, the APC won Ilesha East and Ilesha West by a huge vote of more than 31,000 to PDP’s approximate 11,000, took Atakumosa East and Atakumosa West by a vote of more than 28,000 to PDP’s more than 21,000, and cleared both Oriade and Obokun by more than 23,000 to PDP’s about 18,000. The discriminating Ijesha are unlikely to have viewed the more reflective Mr Oyetola with more suspicion than the absolutely less cerebral Mr Adeleke. Nor are they unmindful of the fact that Mr Aregbesola had the same backers as Mr Oyetola. The fault is in the governor, his mercilessly imposing style, his lack of methodicalness in the state’s finances, his fondness for regimentation in the true Cuban, socialist sense, and according to some, his inability to convince a section of Osun that his approach to secularism is not abysmally below par.
Having recognised that it is coming to office with less plurality than it would have wanted, and in fact more controversy than is healthy, the APC must urgently put together an inclusive government, especially now that they must lie naked in bed and in sultry heat with the hated Iyiola Omisore, the Ife politician whom the progressives, since the assassination of former Justice minister Bola Ige, loved to demonise. Mr Aregbesola did not run an inclusive government, but he was tolerated for as long as possible because the PDP was even more execrable. Nor, it is clear, did he understand the necessity to emplace a cabinet and work together with them, rather than lecturing and hectoring them, having taken more than one year to compose his cabinet in his first term, and about three years to compose a second cabinet in his second term. Mr Oyetola should resist the temptation to think, like the outgoing governor, that he knows everything, or that the knowledge and contributions of a cabinet are superfluous. He needs them, for they will be the key to his success or failure.
If Mr Oyetola wants to have a second term, and to get it without sweating, everything will depend on how well he performs in his first term, how well he relates with powerful groups in the state as well as the ordinary man, and just how brilliantly he reorganises the state’s almost completely broken public finance. He must again resist the temptation to think in highfalutin terms, dreaming projects the state’s resource base cannot sustain. It is okay to dream; but he needs to recognise that if he cannot find the money to match his dreams, he must opt for more sensible and impactful projects. His priority, at all times, must be the people, a people he must respect, serve, love and empower. Like Mr Aregbesola, most Southwest governors will be rounding up their second terms without having managed to build and mentor the leaders of tomorrow, state leaders and national leaders they needed to have selected and carefully mentored from all corners of their states. Mr Oyetola must break the mould, if he can. But let him learn from his own mentor — Mr Aregbesola was his boss, not his mentor.
The governor-elect also needs to surround himself with those who can complement his own endowments. There was nothing a few weeks back to show that he ran a cohesive and brilliant campaign. He may have a good heart and a sound mind, but if the campaign he ran is any indication of his administrative acumen, then he will need help in that department, sharp minds and fearless individuals who can help him run a tight-knit administration . Few people were impressed with the campaign he ran, a campaign that gave him an unconvincing and controversial victory. It is true that much of the damage was done by the outgoing governor, but it was within his capacity, had he run a great campaign, to remedy a part of the terrible wrong that assailed his bid for office. As a matter of fact, during the campaign, the governor-elect seemed sometimes overwhelmed, uncoordinated and needlessly hesitant. As his performance in the debate also showed, he had neither the polemical skill needed for the counterthrust of debates nor a deep grasp of the facts to show convincingly that he was a far better candidate than any other. He still towers above the sybaritic Mr Adeleke, and is not hobbled by the dubieties of Mr Omisore, but he won partly because his co-contestants were non-starters. He, therefore, needs to accurately gauge his strengths without being immobilised by his weaknesses.
The bigger lesson, hopefully, has been learnt by the APC. The national ruling party, this column will continue to maintain, does not possess grand ideas and the democratic principles needed to change the society. It has ruled with the kakistocratic indulgence of religious viziers and proud but pedantic politicians. They had to swallow their pride to get Mr Omisore to turn the Ife votes in their favour. They could easily have lost to a demonstrably inferior candidate. It took them enormous heaving and sweating to take Ekiti from the rambunctious and impolite Governor Ayo Fayose, despite fielding a much intellectually sounder candidate. Even then, the Ekiti victory was still narrow and unconvincing. As the 2019 polls draw near, the APC must ask themselves what messages Ekiti and Osun are telling them. The messages are undoubtedly full of forebodings.
They have replaced their lethargic party chairman John Odigie-Oyegun with the feisty and sometimes insensitive Adams Oshiomhole, and are consequently running a better party than they used to. They will also field the gritty and abrasive President Muhammadu Buhari because they have no choice, not because they think he has the capacity to take Nigeria through the 21st Century. In 2019, the APC is thus likely to meet an angrier and more determined electorate willing to demand both a pound of flesh and the blood that comes with it.
But democracy is paradoxically taking roots even within a dysfunctional and unstructured polity. Believing that there is no alternative to democracy, and impoverished and badly educated, but ruled by emotions and the social media, the electorate will more than ever take graver risks by voting candidates into office, some of them morons, and others self-professed messiahs. Mr Adeleke nearly made it into office in Osun, and those who voted for him are not sorry they did; who can tell how many unqualified candidates will make it into high office as the electorate reassert themselves in an atmosphere of rebellion and misshapen ethics, and especially at a time when none of the leading parties has demonstrated fidelity to democratic principles or to any grand plan and ideas necessary to transform society?