Anambra’s Antumbra and the Soludo Effect
A new ring of fire was visible around the moon in Isuofia, Aguata Local Government Area of Anambra State, as Professor Charles Chukwuma Soludo stepped out of his living room to the patio of his country home to give his first public remarks as the newly elected governor of the State.
Outside in the lit darkness, while the moon still eclipsed the sun before dawn, Mr Soludo checked his watch to ascertain it was not too long after midnight, before he accepted his historic election victory with “humility and gratitude to God” under the klieg lights of the news media filmmakers and over the cheers of his supporters.
The astute academic and international development expert rallied the people of Anambra towards the moon. In his words “Let’s keep the Spirit of Anambra alive and strong, and with it collectively take our homeland to the moon.”
However, even in the ecstasy of victory, the econometrician and politician acknowledged that the election turnout was low, but reckoned that the 10% voter turnout was a sufficient sample size to reflect the will and aspirations of the Anambra people.
“Never mind that all of you could not vote. The limited number that voted is still representative of the wishes of the people”, the Anambra Governor-elect assured.
While the incoming Chief Executive Officer of Anambra State may need to concentrate for now on the state trip to the moon from a land presumably beaming with the “light of the nation” under the incumbent Willie Obiano, political scientists may need to unravel the inverse relationship between voter turnout and election victory margins in the state, and possibly, in the country as a whole.
This would not take away from the fact that Professor Soludo won the Anambra State Governorship election against the odds – defying lethal threats to his life, legal threats to his candidature at the APGA primaries, and more liberal threats from INEC’s machine malfunction even at his own polling booth.
This is besides INEC’s varied logistic failures which posed a real challenge to the smooth conduct of the elections in several places on the 2 election days, as well as the lingering fear that compelled some potential voters to sit at home during the elections even after IPOB’s suspension of the sit at home orders.
We don’t come by the view of an antumbra everyday. Charles Soludo’s Anambra may have the treasured view of that shiny ring of fire that once glimmered around Nigeria’s Apex Bank and financial institutions.
The Ihiala Abracadabra
Prof. Florence Obi, INEC’s Returning Electoral Officer (REC) for the State, in justifying a supplementary election for Ihiala LGA alone, said, “We have collated results for 20 out of the 21 Local Governments Areas. The outstanding result is for Ihiala Local Government Area, where for various reasons the commission could not deploy materials yesterday.”
The Dataphyte Election Monitoring Desk for the Anambra 2021 elections then predicted that the Ihiala supplementary vote on Tuesday 9th November would attract a voter turnout that exceeds the 10.52% average turnout in the concluded elections for the 20 LGAs, and that Charles Soludo, then the APGA Candidate, would have the lead votes in Ihiala LGA as well.
True to the prediction, Charles Soludo won Ihiala despite a lesser voter turnout than the subsisting 10.52% for the rest 20 LGAs. A classic case of all things being (un)equal arose.
The two-sided prediction was based on the historical trend of a relatively high voter turnout in Ihiala LGA and the political leaning of the people there in previous elections.
Dataphyte election monitors observed that “voter turnout in Ihiala LGA has been higher than the state’s average voter turnout in 2 of the last 3 elections. In the 2010 election that produced the eventual winner, Peter Obi, total votes in Ihiala was 20.45% of the total registered voters in the LGA, topping the state average of 16.33%.
Also in the last election that returned Willie Obiano as the Executive Governor of the State, Voters in Ihiala turned out to vote by 23.92%, higher than the general voter turnout of 21.63%.
Also in the past 3 elections in the state, the majority votes in Ihiala were cast for the APGA candidate in each of those elections.”
However, reports of late arrival of INEC’s adhoc staff and election materials reversed all the past records of high voter turnout in Ihiala, especially in a make or mar election to decide the fate of their preferred party.
However, despite disenfranchising many potential voters in Ihiala, no thanks to INEC’s seen and unseen “various reasons”, Ihiala delivered an unprecedented 68% of votes in the LGA to APGA, higher than the average 54% in all the 21 local governments, and only second to Anambra’s East’s 74% votes for APGA.
Yet, it remains a mystery why things went slow with the Ihiala LGA stand alone supplementary election on that day in a proportion unprecedented even when INEC manned the rest 20 LGA elections altogether.
And it remains a mystery why INEC failed to deploy election materials to Ihiala LGA alone in the first instance.
And just like with an abracadabra, the more you look the less you see.
The Quest for Maina’s Bra and the Universality of Service
A day before the Ihiala supplementary elections slated for Tuesday 9th November 2021, while Anambra governorship candidates waited to know their electoral fate, Justice Okon Abang of the Federal High Court in Abuja decided the fate of Abdulrasheed Maina, sentencing him to a jail term of 8 years for money laundering, an equivalent of the maximum 2 terms each of the Anambra governorship candidates would wish for.
Like a newly elected Governor, Mr Maina beamed with smiles and waved at his parting supporters, flanked by his prison security handlers. He was seen in a Channels TV video even wrapping his arm around one of his prison caregivers.
It was not clear why the former Chairman of the now defunct Pension Reform Task Team (PRTT), who claimed to have served the previous government and the present government meritoriously, was all smiles on his way to the correctional centre.
Perhaps he was excited by the prospects of serving the country again, assured he had a longer term to now effect reforms among fellow inmates, this time as Chairman of a similar PPRT, the Prison Reform Task Team.
But Mr Maina’s joyful thought of reform was cut off abruptly as his former persecutors, sorry, prosecutors, wanted more of him. EFCC officials were reported to have wrestled with officers from the Kuje Correctional Centre to hold the convict with them.
It is not clear why the EFCC still wants to have Mr Maina, after the anti graft body had already secured a conviction for the crimes they investigated him for.
The EFCC got the court to convict Abdulrasheed Maina for criminal acquisition of cash and other valuables. A Channels TV report listed among others things,
- Property in Jabi, Abuja worth $1.4 million (paid in cash).
- Luxurious mansion in Dubai
- Maina’s company – Northrich Company which owned over 50 cars.
- Colster Logistics, belonging to Maina received an inflow of over $400,000 from cash deposits.
- Over N500 million was discovered in the account of Kangolo Dynamic, within the years Maina was chairman of PRTT. (The company has never carried out any service or contract).
- Property worth $2 million in Jabi, Abuja.
- Two accounts belonging to Maina hold cash deposits of N300 million, N500 million, and N1.5 billion.
- Properties in the United Arab Emirates and the United States.
- Maina’s firm – Common Input Property and Investment Limited to restitute about N2.1billion that was traced to their bank accounts.
But it seemed Maina’s smiles gave him away to EFCC who probably suspected he had more assets than they unearthed. They had learnt recently that a single bra could be worth more than all they unearthed. What if Maina had a bra too?
One of the bras the EFCC alleged to have seized from Diezani Allison, Nigeria’s former Minister of Petroleum, christened Heavenly Stars by Victoria Secrets in 2001 is said to be one of the costliest bras in the world, and was worth $12.5m.
Many found the seizure and auction of such a very personal belonging of a woman to be unfair and rather misogynistic. It’s not been heard before that investigators seized and auctioned the underwear of a man that they were prosecuting.
Except Mr Maina is persuaded not to appeal the decision of the High Court, just as some are persuading Andy Uba not to appeal the decision of INEC in the Anambra 2021 election, the distinguished pension reformer may already be on his way to serve the disenfranchised electorate in the correctional centre for two full governorship terms, while his fellow civil servant, Charles Soludo would still need to work hard to earn a second term in office.
Speaking of the universality of service. Now it’s too late for the EFCC to keep Abdulrasheed Maina, the hardworking public servant, from beginning his needed reforms in the Kuje penitentiary. It only appears one intelligent officer of the anti graft agency still can’t keep the thought out of his head: what if Maina also has a bra?
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