Search African
Examiner

You need Java to see this applet.
..........................................................................................................................
....................
Advert with us and reach millions of
your target audience world wide
editor@africanexaminer.com
443-904-1239
.......................................
............

Need website?
get 40% discount
darr-concepts
creative studios
contact us:-
admin@darrconcepts.com
www.darrconcepts.com
443-904-1239
Media Associates
Do you want to
contribute
ARTICLES to African
Examiner? We have  
space for You. Click
HERE to Contact
www.grandcaregiver.com
e-mail:-roslync
@grandcaregiver.com
410-644-4994
MAKE BIG
BUCKS IN
HOME
CARE
BUSINESS
Copyrights 2007 S.O &T Communications LLC, All Rights Reserved www.africanexaminer.com.
Africanexaminer is an epublication of S.O & T Communication LLC, P.O. Box 11582 Baltimore, MD, 21229 USA
design and maintain by darrconcepts creative studios
African-Examiner
Photo Gallery
Visit African Examiner... Blog | Sports | Guest Book | Write 4 Us
Ekiti Election Flu
Written by Odimegwu Onwumere

Nigerians should hit the nail on the head regardless of whose ox is gored, because she has
become a bitter pill for some to swallow. While the rest of the world were battling the
outbreak of the scourge called “Swine Flu” which started from ravaging Mexico recently, the
world also focused its searchlight on Nigeria to know what the April 25, 2009 re-run election
would be in Ekiti State, as it was branded by many self-acclaimed “wise men” in the PDP
as a “do-or-die”.

I might be writing rubbish. But Nigerians should always be voluble when it comes to
injustice, because this is our father or motherland. We should stop supporting evil or
anyone who has any intention of supporting or drumbeating for those enchaining Nigerians
and Nigeria, thereby practicing the art of looting before the public glare.
Nigerians of good will should always speak their minds even before anybody’s intimidation.
Was it not Thomas Jefferson who said, "Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God"? Nobody
would one day extend any invitation to anybody in Nigeria to rise up and fight injustice, but
as individuals or groups, we must fight injustice, abuse of power, and dictatorship in Nigeria
in our different ways.

We should not forget in a hurry that Prince Tonye Princewill, the leader of the Action
Congress in Rivers State in March, rising from a meeting, which centered on the arrest of
Lai Mohammed before the Ekiti re-run election, the assassination threat and the run-off
election that came up on ‘this’ 25th of April at Ekiti, called on the Police to release Lai
Mohammed immediately without any further delay and stop any further intimidation of the
opposition as the use of Police by the PDP led Government to score cheap political point
will not in any form deter or cow AC in exposing the deficiency of governance in Nigeria.
“Any attempt to silence the voice of the opposition in Nigeria as currently represented by
AC will be resisted,” said Princewill.

Princewill further admonished politicians across the country to desist from actions capable
of truncating the democratic process that has cost the country so much of the tax payers
money to sustain. He called on President Yar'adua to be transparent and ensure that his
government comes up with an electoral reform that would ensure the peoples mandate in
further elections. This he said would enable the system to undergo an automatic overhaul,
which will certainly keep venal and insincere persons with a propensity for violence and
disregard for human life away from politics. Nigeria, he said is blessed with enormous
human capital that is not being harnessed because of an electoral system that is flawed,
giving rise to a lot of misplaced protagonists who style themselves as leaders while the
patriots shy away for fear of being assassinated.

But did anybody paid heed to Princewill’s admonishment? Is what the PDPians and gang
are doing to Nigerians fine with us? I always lose sleep over it. Nobody is inviting anybody
either to join the crusade against injustice, albeit many were called, but few were chosen.
After all, is Obasanjo not a god to many? I am looking for that day when we all shall stand
out and say enough is enough in the concentration of the populace in Nigeria.

Under the current condition and the current INEC, why must election be re-run in Nigeria
and PDP will continue to win? Not that PDP wins on a clear ground; there is always
allegation of irregularities that mars “their” election. We always experience uselessness of a
bed-in government in the PDP-ruling Nigeria. "The vast majority of the race, whether savage
or civilized, are secretly kind-hearted and shrink from inflicting pain, but in the presence of
the aggressive and pitiless minority they don't dare to assert themselves". - Mark Twain

While many Nigerians are still are for or against this ghastly accident called election, many
editions of 05.06.2009 Nigerian newspapers, reportedly said that the Presidential candidate
of the All Peoples Party (APP) in the 1999 presidential election, Chief Olu Falae, said that
he does not know the circumstances in which Mr. Segun Oni, governorship candidate of the
Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), was declared winner of the governorship supplementary
election in Ekiti State. Oni said he would not comment on the outcome of the governorship
election in Ekiti State, until he got full detail of what transpired? On his part, President and
founder of the Odua Peoples Congress (OPC), Dr. Frederick Fahseun, said that people
should be true to their conscience. “Let everybody be true to his or conscience,” Faseun
said. The Publicity Secretary of the Action Congress (AC), Alhaji Lai Mohammed said the
party would not accept the result of the governorship election in Ekiti State as declared by
the Resident Electoral Commissioner, Mrs. Ayoka Adebayo.

“The victory for Oni and PDP, it is victory of impunity. Unfortunately, the same impunity will
consume PDP. We are not accepting this result and we shall go to court to challenge it.
How come only 2,100 voted in Oye Ekiti said to have about 18,000 voters? We call on all
well meaning Nigerians of goodwill to join us in our fight to restore electoral integrity in
Nigeria,” Mohammed said.

But even that Mr. Segun Oni of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) formally got the nod to
come back as governor of the state, he might not have the nod before his conscience that,
“I truly won a free and fair election.”. Mrs. Ayoka Adebayo, the state Resident Electoral
Commissioner (REC), declared him winner of the rerun in 63 wards across 10 local
governments of the state. But can this declaration mark the end of the tension-soaked
governorship rerun in the state? Did this election squabble in Ekiti not begin last April 25
and which witnessed a rescheduled poll 5th May 2009 in two wards of Oye Local
Government? Did the declaration of Oni not come amid confusion and protest by supporters
of the opposition Action Congress (AC) at the collation centre at Christ High School, Ado-
Ekiti, the state capital? Did AC supporters not move to the streets in protest immediately
after the pronouncement? However, reportedly, according to Adebayo, Oni polled 44,306 to
beat Dr. Kayode Fayemi of AC who polled 28,238 votes in the 10 councils. Is this not
incongruous? Was the results earlier validated by the Court of Appeal not, PDP has 65,743
and AC 78,091? Did this in earnest bring the final figures of the governorship poll as follows:
PDP-110,049 and AC- 106,329?

I know that Oni will by now be swimming in congratulatory messages particularly from
selfish PDP leaders and governors who have begun pouring in for the governor-elect, to “see
my candidate for an appointment.” This could be why the AC National Publicity Secretary
Lai Muhammed said: “It is a sad day for democracy and Nigeria. People’s vote no longer
counts. The Resident Electoral Commissioner should come out and tell the whole world
why she disappeared and resurfaced again. Where has her Christianity gone to?” Even
Wole Soyinka called what happened in Ekiti, apartheid worst than South Africa’s.
Odimegwu Onwumere is the Founder of Poet Against Child Abuse (PACA), Rivers State.
08032552855. apoet_25@yahoo.com