Ten Tips and Realities Regarding Party Primaries and The 2023 General Election

As you all know, time for Nigerians to choose who will rule them for the next 4 years is drawing closers day by day.

Due to hardship Nigerians pass through in the hand of President Muhammadu Buhari government, it expected that Citizens will wise up this time around to make the right decision.

As such, Nigerians must have basic knowledge about what has changed in Nigerian Electorial law.

So We Naijablog bring this Ten Tips and Realities Regarding Party Primaries and The 2023 General Election for you.

Don’t skip anyone, read all to understand, because this election matters.

  1. Once you’ve purchased a particular party’s form and agree to participate in the primaries you cannot withdraw and contest on another party’s platform in the same election.
  2. Regarding the issue of consensus candidate, all aspirants must write and sign an acknowledgement letter agreeing to withdraw and endorse the favoured aspirant. The letters must be written and signed willingly (not under duress) by all the aspirants given their consents and indicating their willingness to withdraw from the race on behalf of the consensus candidate.
  3. A political party can choose to either conduct a direct (general) or indirect (delegate) primaries.
  4. It should be noted that state governors are fully in charge of their party’s primaries; no aspirant should deceive himself or herself that he/she can win the primaries of a party of which the governor is a member without the governors approval or support; The governors are fully in control of their party’s delegates. Few exceptions are possible of course, but the number seat in the state is always exclusively decided by the governor in his political party.
  5. It should also be understood that a governors forceful endorsement of his preferred aspirants on others comes with its risks; If the other aspirants didn’t agree or were forced, under duress, to withdraw from the race, they can simply seek for redress in the court of law. The repercussions are that the primaries be will be cancelled; and the party involved will not participate in the general elections; or if it participates, their results will be cancelled and the second party in line will be declared as winner. Zamfara state in 2019 is a classic example.
    — So a Governor must be able to unite his party aspirants before the primaries and make them agree willingly to a consensus candidate. And if they don’t agree, it is always safer to allow everyone to participate in the primaries in order to avoid litigation of any sort.
  6. The newly signed electoral law, as amended, gives equal opportunities to all aspirants and all political parties.
    So if you are not sure of clinching the ticket of the two (2) main parties— APC & PDP— and you are assured of your capacity and popularity, you can join any other registered political party to contest for the position of your dream.
    Armed with the new electoral act, many aspirants are already defecting from the two main parties to other political platforms to contest.
  7. Election results will be transmitted electronically. The Card Readers will be connected to INEC mother server at Headquarters automatically corresponding the results from the PU. According to the new electoral law, only this result is valid.
  8. If a Card Reader does not work, or is being vandalized, the results of the Polling Unit involved will be out rightly cancelled, as writing on Incident Forms is not legally valid anymore.
    —Hence, results transmitted by the Card Readers are the only authentic and legally recognized results.
  9. So the opportunity of tampering with results or stealing and vandalizing of ballot boxes by hired thugs have been effectively rendered useless by the new electoral act.
  10. The easiest and surest way to win elections is to encourage your supporters to get their PVCs; mobilize them on election day to come out en-mass to vote for you on any platform you choose to contest. No one can overturn the election result.

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