Nigeria, the largest democracy in Africa, conducted its presidential and National Assembly elections on February 25, 2023.
The elections saw the defeat of heavy weights in the two major political parties — the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) and the All Progressives Congress (APC).
For instance, in Anambra, Abia, Lagos, Enugu, and Kaduna states, candidates of the Labour Party (LP), some of who were not popular, won senatorial and House of Representatives seats, defeating those of the major parties.
While this development may be attributed to a number of factors, which include the yearning for a new order and shift away from the APC and the PDP, the “top-to-bottom” voting approach adopted by the supporters of the LP, popularly known as the Obidients, may backfire.
The top-to-bottom voting approach involves voting for all the LP candidates vying for various positions.
One of the arguments put forward by supporters of the LP for this voting style is that they want to build a political structure. While this may count as a valid argument for the supporters of the party, who were taunted in the lead-up to the presidential election for lacking a political structure, little attention seems to be paid to the profile of some of the candidates running under the party.
Dataphyte’s checks on two of the party’s governorship candidates, particularly the Benue and Adamawa candidates, raise some concerns.
The Benue LP guber candidate has faced two bribery allegations in two years.
The standard bearer of the LP governorship candidate in Benue State, Herman Hembe, was in the news in 2012 for various controversies bordering on bribery allegations.
According to a report by the International Centre for Investigative Reporting (ICIR), Hembe was a former lawmaker in the green chambers and was the chairman of the House Committee on Capital Markets and other Financial Institutions.
The then Director-General of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Arunma Oteh, had accused the committee chaired by Hembe of demanding combined bribes totalling N44 million from her.
Also, as the Chairman of the Committee on Capital Markets and other Financial Institutions, Hembe was said to have collected estacodes and other travel allowances from the SEC to travel to the Dominican Republic on a capacity-building conference for capital market regulators. According to Oteh, Hembe did not attend the conference and never returned the money collected.
Although Hembe denied the allegation of demanding a bribe from the former DG of SEC, Arunma Oteh, the ICIR noted that the committee chaired by Hembe could not extricate itself from the scandal.
Recently, in response to a tweet put out on Twitter raising concerns about the integrity of Hembe, the former SEC DG, Oteh, challenged the LP to walk the talk, stating that wrong should never become right because of party affiliation.
This may not be unconnected to the 2012 bribery scandal.
Following the accusation in 2012, it was reported that Hembe resigned from his position as the chairman of the Committee on Capital Markets and other Financial Institutions. However, in 2016, he was appointed as the Chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and was to investigate the $18 billion Centenary City project under the President Goodluck Jonathan administration.
Just like the first committee he chaired, he was accused again, this time by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Anyim Pius Anyim, of asking a managing director related to the case being probed to see him “privately.”
“Two, Mr Chairman, you have been threatening to conduct this public hearing for over a year now. In fact, you ended last year with it, and this year, you started again with it. You scheduled it for January 27, and you later moved it to February 1 and again moved it to February 3,” Anyim had said.
“Mr Chairman, we only discovered your game plan for all the postponements when you started sending messages to the managing director to come and see you privately.
“It was after all your efforts to get the managing director to come and see you privately failed that you confirmed this date. I want you to know that nobody will see you privately, and we are here for the hearing, and we will have the hearing,” Anyim had stated.
Although Hembe denied the allegation just like the first one leveled against him, they are, however, concerning as the people of Benue head to the polls to decide on March 18.
The LP governorship candidate in Adamawa State is also one of the candidates reviewed by Dataphyte.
Adamawa LP governorship candidate
In 2015, the LP Adamawa governorship candidate, Mr. Mustapha Umar Madawaki, was arrested and charged to court by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in relation to the failed Kriston Lally/Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) Housing Project.
The Adamawa LP guber candidate was accused by the NLC of illegally collecting money from the subscribers of the project.
Upon declaration of his interest in the number one office in Adamawa, the NLC last year revisited the issue, reminding the people of the state of Mustapha Umar Madawaki’s antecedents and warning them to reject him.
The NLC released a statement to this effect. Part of the statement read thus: “Following the seriousness of the allegations preferred against Mr. Mustapha Umar Madawaki, the outcry of workers, and the proactive steps taken by the NLC leadership, the EFCC had to step into the matter. After a thorough investigation, the EFCC charged Mr. Mustapha Umar Madawaki to court. The case between Mr. Mustapha Umar Madawaki and the Federal Government of Nigeria at the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) High Court 14, Nyanya, Abuja, Charge No: C12/23/17, is currently before Hon. Justice U.P. Kekemeke and has been ongoing since 2017.
“Until Mr. Mustapha Umar Madawaki establishes his innocence, the Nigeria Labour Congress would never lend its support to such suspicious characters who have very serious criminal charges in the court of law.”
Political watchers say the voting approach by the LP supporters could cost the party its integrity, especially if people with questionable character are elected.
They believe that the LP should be canvassing for support for people of integrity irrespective of their party affiliations, stressing that it would be hypocritical for the party to toe the line of old parties which Nigerians are trying to get rid of.
One analyst said some persons of questionable character were hiding in the LP, waiting to ride on the party’s popularity to win elections.
The LP reacts
Commenting on the antecedents of the LP Adamawa and Benue governorship candidates, the LP presidential campaign spokesman, Yinusa Tanko, said the LP did background checks on its candidates, noting that should there be allegations against candidates running under the party’s platform, they would need to prove their innocence as the LP held high character as one of its principles.
On the issue of “top-bottom” voting pattern being adopted by the supporters of the party, Tanko noted that the LP was focused on building a political structure, and it was one of the ways to go about it. He said that he had also been “encouraging supporters of the party to vote top-to-bottom.”
“Yesterday, I was in Warri, Delta State, and I told the supporters of the LP in the state to vote LP top-to-bottom in the upcoming election,” he said.
When Dataphyte queried about the implication of this voting style, Tanko posited that the LP had done the needed checks on the candidates running under its platform, and the goal was to get them elected to build a political structure first, then immerse them into the values the party stood for — character, competence, among others.
A policy consultant who spoke to Dataphyte, Timi Olagunju, noted that while it was expected that the supporters of the parties would adopt this voting style, that is, it was important for competence and capacity of the candidate to be considered, not just the party affiliation.