Anambra Governorship State election – By Jideofor Adibe

The 18 November 2017 governorship election in Anambra State has come and gone. The incumbent Governor Willie Obiana has been declared the winner and losers are either silently licking their wounds or plotting their next moves.

While on paper, a total of 37 candidates – the highest in our political history – took part in the election; in reality only five candidates were deemed serious enough to have been invited to take part in the debates.

It will remain debatable why so many candidates chose to put themselves on the ballot paper even when they knew they had no chance in hell of winning. It will also remain debatable why historically we have had low voter turnouts in governorship elections in Anambra state – compared to the national average.

It was no doubt a peaceful election – with a few operational lapses here and there.

But was the election ‘free and fair’? Here we get into the domain of subjectivity where even the meaning of ‘free’ and ‘fair’ will be contentious. What was obvious was that while we may have seen a tightening in the traditional windows for rigging, a new avenue for corrupting the outcome of the process has emerged and had a field day during the election. This is aggressive vote buying on Election Day. All the major parties were equally guilty. Depending on the voter’s bargaining skills, a vote went for N3000-N5000 – plus a plate of rice with meat (one party was said to have upped the game by offering a plate of warm rice with two pieces of meat). Is this economic rationality on the part of voters or stupidity?

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