Seyi Makinde, the opposition and limits of intimidation
Speaking at the opening of a summit of opposition leaders in Ibadan last week, Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State warned against the alleged stifling of opposition in the country
Speaking at the opening of a summit of opposition leaders in Ibadan last week, Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State warned against the alleged stifling of opposition in the country and hinted, darkly, that Ibadan was the place where the gruesome 'operation wetie' in the Western Region started in the First Republic. For emphasis, he stressed that the South West region remains the same 'Wild Wild West' of that notorious fame. A far more cerebral and enlightened Governor Bola Ige had sought, in the Second Republic, to rebrand Ibadan and the West in general in the far more ennobling garb of 'Wise Wise West'.
Calm, urbane, restrained, cultured and perceived to be following in the footsteps of his predecessor, the late Governor Abiola Ajimobi, in terms of performance, Governor Makinde has suddenly become intolerant, intemperate, impatient and lacking in restraint in pursuit of his political objectives. This inexplicable personality transformation has predisposed him to making avoidable tactical mistakes, such as the sponsorship of the ill-fated National Convention of the PDP in Ibadan, flagrantly violating two orders of the Federal High Court in the process.
Another example was the absurd crowning of three new traditional rulers in Ibadan, even in their absence! This was said to have been motivated by a desire to stop a serving APC Senator from the State from contesting the governorship position, which he believes would be a violation of traditional law in the state. This only opened the governor to considerable ridicule as the said Senator has obtained the requisite forms to contest the election on the platform of the APC.
Governor Makinde's supporters contend that he is acting in defence of democracy by opposing alleged attempts by the ruling APC to impose a one-party system on the country. The governor had claimed that he was present at a meeting where the former Rivers State governor and now FCT Minister, Barrister Nyesom Wike, had promised to hold down the PDP to facilitate President Tinubu's re-election for a second term. This is an account Wike has vigorously denied, and which no other person at the meeting has corroborated.
In any case, Makinde convened the summit of opposition leaders, which was successfully held in Ibadan. Makinde and the attendees were exercising their democratic rights to freedom of movement, association, thought and speech, among others. Such fundamental human rights are not respected and do not thrive in a dictatorship. One of the decisions stated in the communique issued at the meeting was that opposition parties would field one candidate against the ruling APC in the presidential election. This was an implicit admission that the loss of opposition candidates to President Tinubu in the 2023 presidential election was due more to lack of unity in opposition ranks than the tiresomely repeated allegation of massive rigging of the polls.
Even then, some dissenting voices against the presentation of a common Presidential candidate by opposition parties have arisen among opposition leaders not present in Ibadan. Even for those who attended the summit, none of the leading contenders has publicly stated any intention to step down for any other aspirant. If they go through what will obviously be bruising primary contests, will the opposition be able to contest the election as a cohesive and vibrant whole? It is unlikely, but time will tell.
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Some commentators have tried to justify Governor Makinde's wetie comment by reference to an allegedly inciting statement made by the then leader of the opposition in Nigeria, President Bola Tinubu, in the run-up to the 2014 governorship election in Ekiti State if the polls were rigged. The truth of the matter is that the electoral landscape in Nigeria has changed fundamentally since previous elections, such as the 2003, 2007, or the 2011 elections in Nigeria and the 2014 elections in Ekiti and Osun. It was the marked improvement in elections' structures and processes that enabled, for instance, Governor Makinde's electoral triumph in Oyo in the 2019 governorship election.
It is no coincidence that stuffing of the voters' register with multiple and fake names, snatching and stuffing of ballot boxes, and multiple thumb-printing of ballot papers no longer feature in our elections. The introduction of such innovations as the card reader, Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) and the uploading of results from the polling units to the INEC Review Electronic Viewing portal (IREV) have contributed significantly to sanitising Nigerian elections, thus making any insinuations of resurrecting the operation wetie culture in the West far-fetched, unrealistic and not feasible.
Now, what was the background to the murderous operation wetie in the West, which Governor Makinde gleefully referred to? The dousing with petrol and setting on fire of opposition elements in the region came against the backdrop of the bitter contestation by both the Premier SLA Akintola tendency of the party and that of Chief Obafemi Awolowo, leader of the Action Group (AG), as well as leader of the opposition in Lagos, for control of the soul of the party and the government of the Western Region.
The descent to anarchy in the region intensified with the massive rigging of the 1964 federal elections in the West, leading to the triumph of the Akintola faction, which had the support of the Tafawa Balewa - led Federal Government, against the Awolowo faction, which was more popular among the populace. This brazen electoral armed robbery was repeated in the Western Regional elections of 1965. Bola Ige meticulously documents the pervasive incidents of flagrant violations of the electoral rules by Akintola's NNDP.
These included illegal return of the NNDP government - backed candidates as unopposed in multiple constituencies as electoral officers made themselves unavailable to receive nomination papers from opposition candidates, the refusal of the NNDP government to publish the least of electoral officers to confuse opposition parties and the electorate, and ballot papers printed by the government were "handed over to those they could trust in the Police and Civil Service".
It was a time in the Western Region when the kind of summit of opposition leaders convened by Governor Makinde could not hold. The Akintola government even banned the circulation of perceived hostile newspapers like the Daily Times in the region in 1964. Human rights were assaulted with impunity. In the words of Bola Ige, "All of the Nigerian press, and foreign journalists converged on Western Nigeria. On election day, they witnessed the greatest show of shame for democracy. The most blatant rigging took place. As one reputed journalist put it: he saw men pregnant with ballot papers delivering them into NNDP boxes, even though it was clear from the heavy turnout of voters that most of the voters were for AG/UPGA".
Can Governor Makinde honestly swear that this kind of scenario still obtains in Nigeria's electoral landscape of today? It is unlikely. Indeed, the 2023 presidential election saw the three leading candidates winning in 12 states each, with Peter Obi's victory in the FCT also bringing his total number of victories to 12 territorial entities. But President Tinubu won the highest number of votes by any single candidate, as well as securing the required constitutional spread required for a candidate to triumph at the polls.
It was perhaps the most hotly contested and competitive election in the country's electoral history. Yet, it is an election that the opposition has spared no effort to denigrate, even as they step up efforts to damage the credibility and integrity of electoral, judicial, and security authorities preemptively ahead of next year's elections.
Makinde's outburst in Ibadan fits neatly into this narrative of attempting to intimidate and harass the incumbent APC government at the centre and critical institutions of state like those mentioned above ahead of next year's elections. It is a tactic that has not worked in the past and is unlikely to work now. Just yesterday, the apex court ruled on the ADC leadership suit before it and overruled the Court of Appeal's ruling on maintaining the status quo ante bellum, and INEC has immediately restored the names of the David Mark -led Interim National Working Committee (NWC) on its website.
Earlier, following another court judgment which upheld the Nenadi Usman -led faction's claim to the leadership of the Labour Party (LP), the party has been duly recognised by INEC and successfully held its National Convention this week. All the talk about attempts by the incumbent government at the centre to utilise the judiciary and INEC to impose a one-party state on the country, thus amounts to careless and irresponsible assertions. In the case of the ADC, the Supreme Court has directed the party to return to the Federal High Court for the continuation of its case, while also directing the court to accord the case an accelerated hearing. The case would have long been determined but for the David Mark -led NWC's decision to undertake the inexplicably unnecessary voyage to the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court.
Governor Seyi Makinde and other opposition elements who think like him should shake off their complacency and lethargy, tackle the organizational challenges they face within their respective parties with greater honesty and sense of purpose and prepare to give the ruling party a run for its money in future elections.
