Buhari and the 2023 elections

President Muhammadu Buhari and his governing All Progressives Congress, APC, are the chief beneficiaries of credible elections in Nigeria. 

Thanks to further introduction of technology in the electoral process through the Smart Card Reader, SCR, and the Permanent Voter Card, PVC, which proved to be game changers, the President and his party rode to power on the crest of a more transparent election in 2015. 

And thanks to the generosity of spirit of the former President, Goodluck Jonathan, who took the unprecedented step of conceding even before the 2015 presidential election was officially returned by the former Chief Electoral Officer of the Federation, Professor Attahiru Jega, the transition of power was smooth and peaceful.

If President Buhari and his party, the APC, were the major beneficiaries of transparent elections and a salubrious transitional environment, the two had been the very Achilles heels and antagonists-in-chief of the electoral process. 

Under President Buhari’s watch, not only were the electoral process and electoral reforms given the short shrift, his party carried itself with unsurpassed hubris. In Zamfara State, the party brazenly refused to submit itself to holding valid primaries ahead of the 2019 general elections.