2007 Nigerian general election: Difference between revisions

This article documents a current event. Information may change rapidly as the event progresses, and initial news reports may be unreliable. The latest updates to this article may not reflect the most current information. Feel free to improve this article or discuss changes on the talk page, but please note that updates without valid and reliable references will be removed. (April 2007) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Politics of Nigeria
Constitution Human rights
Government President (list) Bola Tinubu Vice President Kashim Shettima Cabinet Federal Parastatals
Legislature National Assembly of Nigeria Senate President Godswill Akpabio (APC) Deputy President Barau Jibrin (APC) (List of members of the Senate) House of Representatives Speaker Tajudeen Abbas (APC) Deputy Speaker Benjamin Kalu (APC) (List of members of the House) State delegations Abia Adamawa Akwa Ibom Anambra Bauchi Bayelsa Benue Borno Cross River Delta Ebonyi Edo Ekiti Enugu Gombe Imo Jigawa Kaduna Kano Katsina Kebbi Kogi Kwara Lagos Nasarawa Niger Ogun Ondo Osun Oyo Plateau Rivers Sokoto Taraba Yobe Zamfara FCT
Judiciary Supreme Court
Subdivisions States State governors Local Government Areas
Elections Recent elections Parliamentary:2015 2019 2023 Political parties
Foreign relations Ministry of Foreign Affairs Minister: Yusuf Tuggar Diplomatic missions of / in Nigeria Nationality law Passport Visa requirements Visa policy
Nigeria portal Other countries
v t e

The Nigerian general elections of 2007 were held on April 14 and April 21, 2007.^[1] Governorship and state assembly elections were held on April 14, while the presidential and national assembly elections were held a week later on April 21.

[This introduction need to be expand. Your help is welcome]

President Olusegun Obasanjo failed to secure a third term, as he was unsupported by Atiku Abubakar, his vice-president. Presidential candidates were announced in late December 2006.^[2] Umaru Yar'Adua contested the election for the ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP), and the opposition All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) chose Muhammadu Buhari.^[3] Atiku Abubakar, the current Vice-President, announced on 25 November 2006 that he would contest the election,^[4] and he subsequently became the presidential candidate of the Action Congress in December.^[5]

28 of the 36 states are controlled the PDP but the largest city, Lagos, is in the hands of the Alliance for the Democracy (AD) since 1999.

However, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared Abubakar ineligible to run due to fraud charges. A High Court had ruled that the commission could not disqualify candidates, but INEC claimed that the constitution barred candidates from running if indicted. Another superior court, the Court of Appeal, ruled in favour of the Electoral Commission by saying that it has powers to disqualify candidates. Abubakar attempted to get on the ballot via court challenge. In a case that came before the apex court, the court ruled that INEC has no constitutional powers to disqualify any candidates for the election, clearing the way for Abubakar to run. The Supreme Court, the country's highest judicial body, confirmed this ruling and reaffirmed Abubakar's candidacy.^[6]

Adebayo Adefarati, the candidate of the small Alliance for Democracy, died shortly before the election on 29 March 2007. This raised the possibility of the election being delayed, as the law provides for a delay under the circumstances if requested by the party that had nominated the candidate; however, a spokesman for INEC said that the election would not be delayed.^[7] He said that the party could nominate a replacement candidate.^[8]

Nigerian military killed at least 25 suspected Islamic militants 18 April, while battling extremists who attacked a police station on 17 April in Kano, days before the election.^[9] Shortly before voting began on 21 April, there was an alleged attempt in Bayelsa State to kill Goodluck Jonathan, who is the PDP vice-presidential candidate and the governor of the state, as well as a failed attempt to destroy INEC headquarters in Abuja with a truck bomb.^[10]

Nigeria has never yet managed a peaceful handover from one democratically elected president at the end of his constitutional term to the next.^[11] The most recent failed election was the 1993 election of M. K. O. Abiola, which was annulled by Ibrahim Babangida, the military dictator ruling at the time. General Sani Abacha eventually seized power, and when Abiola tried to claim his presidency, he was imprisoned until his questionable death in 1998.^[12]

The ruling PDP won 26 of the 32 states, according to INEC, including Kaduna State and Katsina State, where the results were contested by the local population; the election will have to be rerun in Imo State and Enugu State due to complications.^[13] By the last count, Obasanjo's PDP party had won 29 of 33 states so far declared, with Human Rights Watch describing the vote-rigging as "shameless".^[14]

Following the gubernatorial and state assembly elections on 14 April, 18 parties, including those of Abubakar and Buhari, demanded on 17 April that the presidential election be postponed, that INEC be disbanded, and that the earlier elections be annulled; otherwise, they said that they would consider boycotting the presidential election.^[15] On 19 April, however, both Buhari's ANPP and Abubakar's Action Congress said that they would not boycott the election.^[16]

The 60 million presidential election ballot papers were kept in South Africa to prevent tampering. ^[17] However, last-minute changes to add Abubakar to the list caused problems in distribution of ballots as papers did not arrive from South Africa until Friday evening. ^[18] The reprinted papers were not serially numbered as was intended. ^[19]

Official figures on voter turnout were not released but the turnout was estimated at 57.5 percent of 61.5 million registered voters.^[20]

The first results to be released, from Rivers State, showed a large majority for Yar'Adua.^[21][22] On April 23, Yar'Adua was declared the winner by INEC, which said that he had received 70% of the vote^[23] (24,638,063 votes).^[24] Buhari was said to be in second place with 18% of the vote^[23] (6,605,299 votes),^[24] while Abubakar was placed third with about 7%^[23] (2,637,848 votes).^[24] Both Buhari and Abubakar rejected the results, considering it rigged in Yar'Adua's favor.^[23]

Outgoing president Olusegun Obasanjo stated in a televised address that the election "could not be described as perfect". ^{[23] [25]}

Results, announced by The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Chairman, Prof. Maurice Iwu were:^[26]

The results did not disclose the total votes scored in the states or the percentages of the scores by the presidential candidates.

Ikimi and Amusu, the representatives of the AC and the ANPP at the INEC Collation Centre in Abuja, denounced the results announced by the INEC Chairman. According to Ikimi, "In states like Edo, Enugu, Ebonyi, Imo, Akwa Ibom etc, we know that the elections did not start even as late as 5 pm. The results collated showed that over 80 percent of the votes being counted in favour of the PDP and they are totally flawed. In most of the states, only the Resident Electoral Commissioners and the PDP Agents signed the results. We have been here since yesterday (Sunday) to observe this collation and we only collated eleven states and the INEC Chairman just rushed down to declare the results and declare Umoru Yar’Adua as the winner."^[26]

According to Ikimi, "The result sheets we viewed so far was not signed by any of our agents at the state level. They were only signed by Resident Electoral Commissioners and only the PDP agents."^[26]

Also, Admiral Lanre Amusu who represented the ANPP at the INEC collation centre concurred what Chief Tom Ikimi said. "I am in total agreement with what Chief Ikimi has just said. Only results from 13 states and they were collated and signed by the Resident Electoral Commissioners in the States and the PDP Agents. Our agents did not sign these results."^[26]

Following the presidential election, groups monitoring the election gave it a dismal assessment. Chief EU observer Max van den Berg reported that the handling of the polls had "fallen far short" of basic international standards, and that "the process cannot be considered to be credible"^[27], citing "poor election organisation, lack of transparency, significant evidence of fraud, voter disenfranchisement, violence and bias"^[25].

One group of observers said that at one polling station in Yenagoa, in the oil-rich south, where 500 people were registered to vote, more than 2,000 votes were counted.^[22]

The winner of the presidential election is scheduled to be inaugurated on May 29, 2007.^[1]

 United States: A spokesman for the United States State Department said it was "deeply troubled" by election polls which it said were "flawed", and hoped the political parties would resolve any differences over the election through peaceful, constitutional means. ^[23]

"Nigeria has once again failed to rise to the occasion... Size isn't enough... It is a failed giant," said prominent Ghanaian economist Nii Moi Thompson. ^[28]

"There is the saying: 'How goes Nigeria, so goes the rest of Africa'. To have this widespread abuse of the democratic initiative certainly doesn't do Africa any good," said Scott Baker, a professor at Champlain College in the US city of Burlington, Vermont.^[28]

"Even Liberia, which is coming out of war, had more credible elections than Nigeria," said Thompson. ^[28]

"How can Nigeria sit at the meetings of the African Union African Peer Review Mechanism or Ecowas and talk about other people's elections?" asked Baker. ^[28]

• [Official INEC results page for Presidential]