Today’s declaration by the Court of Appeal sitting in Ilorin that Dr. Kayode Fayemi is the duly elected governor of Ekiti State rather than the usurper, Segun Oni, who had occupied the office for the past three and a half years came late, very late in the day.
Today’s declaration by the Court of Appeal sitting in Ilorin that Dr. Kayode Fayemi is the duly elected governor of Ekiti State rather than the usurper, Segun Oni, who had occupied the office for the past three and a half years came late, very late in the day.
The decision, coming just seven and a half months before the end of the four-year term is something that should ordinarily worry every Nigerian and the judiciary. However, the most politically sumptuous part of the legal victory may also be that it came very late and very close to the 2011 elections.
The victory once again does violence to the PDP created, promoted and re-enforced myth of invincibility. It says the PDP is not invincible. It says in the face of empirical evidence, some judges, not yet all of them, are prepared to stand on the side of justice and genuine rule of law. Attahiru Jega and INEC have promised to collect and make available to challengers of poll results, biometric information collected from voters during voters’ registration, there is hope that while the PDP suffers from an incurable disease of election rigging, biometric information will make it easier to establish cases of electoral fraud. It tells all those who are prepared to persevere that there may just be light at the end of the tunnel. For all those who care about Nigeria and are determined to stop the PDP rigging machine, the decision could not have come at a better time. With a few months to the election, there could have been no better way to fire up all those who labor to wrest their states and the nation from the stranglehold of the PDP. This victory invigorates everyone who is determined to confront the PDP with a view to establishing that the PDP could not have won in states like Oyo, Osun and Ogun: in terms of political ideology and antecedents, the voters in these states do not belong in the criminal and retrogressive political framework called the PDP.
For those strategizing on behalf of Goodluck Jonathan and the PDP, Ekiti is one more state they will have to strike off their list of possible states. There are many others around the country. Given the fact that the PDP is deeply divided within itself and there exists the possibility of an implosion over the issue of zoning; the possibility of the losers in the PDP presidential nomination race will working to ensure that the successful nominee (presumptively Goodluck Jonathan) does not win the general election; the growing popularity and appeal of Mohamadu Buhari, especially in the northern part of the country; the presence of Nuhu Ribadu in ACN and his appeal to a certain segment of the populace; the PDP has never been as vulnerable as it is going into the 2011 general elections. There is no better time for the progressives to put their house in order, strategize in the interest of Nigerians and finally bring down the PDP, the house built on a false and criminal foundation.
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