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Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has condemned the Rivers State local government elections, describing the process and outcome as “an awful absurdity and a travesty to the very notion of elective democracy.”
Atiku accused President Bola Tinubu’s administration of manipulating the polls. Heom said: “By the shameful and shambolic manner in which the occupation government went ahead to conduct local government elections in Rivers State, it is clear that the ruling APC party is not leaving anyone in doubt that it is prepared to throw caution to the wind to achieve an inordinate political advantage.”
The elections, held on August 30, saw the All Progressives Congress (APC) win 20 of the 23 local government areas, while the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) secured the remaining three. The results were announced by the Rivers State Independent Electoral Commission (RSIEC) on Sunday.
Notably, Governor Siminalayi Fubara lost his own LGA, Opobo-Nkoro, to the APC. Both APC and PDP winners are loyalists of Minister of the Federal Capital Territory and former Rivers governor, Nyesom Wike, further consolidating his control of the state’s political grassroots.
RSIEC Chairman Dr Michael Odey said: “Today marks an important milestone in the democratic process in Rivers State. Yesterday (Saturday), the people of Rivers State trooped out in their numbers to exercise their civic duty. It is now our responsibility as a commission and in line with the law to transparently and credibly present the outcome of their collective will.” He commended stakeholders, security agencies, civil society groups, and the electorate for what he described as a peaceful process.
Atiku, however, rejected the results, calling on Nigerians and the international community to take note of what he called “a dangerous curve that the President Bola Tinubu regime is taking our dear country.”
He urged opposition parties in Rivers to reject the outcome: “I will also call on all opposition parties in Rivers State to reject the local government election on the premise that the occupation government that conducted the exercise is extraneous to our laws, with absolutely no legitimacy to undertake such a crucial and sensitive assignment.”
Atiku expressed solidarity with Rivers people, saying they are “currently victims of political brigandry to a power cabal which is bent on overturning their democratic rights at all costs.”
Meanwhile, political analysts argue that Wike’s dominance may be short-lived. High Chief Sunnie Chukumele, Convener of the Coalition of Rivers State Leaders of Thought, said: “There is a subsisting Supreme Court judgement that is less than one year old. What they have done is an aberration. It is contemptuous of the Supreme Court’s judgment. So it will not stand. It is as temporary as it will not last.”
Former House of Representatives member Hon. Ogbonna Nwuke also questioned the credibility of the polls, saying: “What is critical is, frankly, how the voting took place… If Rivers people actually turned out to vote in such numbers, then it means that Wike’s structure is solidly on the ground. But if the voting pattern indicates otherwise, the minister himself must look again at Rivers people, why they voted the way they did, because that will be very instructive.”
