On February 25, 2023, the presidential and National Assembly elections, moderated by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, successfully held. Despite some challenges which were largely not novel to the organisation of democratic elections the world over, a winner, in consonance with the minimum constitutional requirements deservedly emerged.
Following his victory, Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu, the candidate of the ruling All Progressives Alliance, APC, who scored 8.88million votes was formally declared the president-elect on March 1 by INEC after defeating 17 other candidates. He was subsequently given his letter of return by the electoral management body, INEC.
It is now over five weeks since the victory that flowed from an intensely contested presidential election. While many countries and presidents have congratulated Nigeria’s president-elect, at the home front it’s a horse of a different colour.
Since this victory, while many of the defeated 17 presidential contestants have magnanimously congratulated Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, none of the so-called front-running presidential challengers: Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples’ Democratic Party, PDP; Peter Obi of the Labour Party, LP; and Musa Kwankwaso of the New Nigeria Peoples Party, NNPP, have congratulated the President-elect.
It could be recalled that ahead of the February 25 elections, in January, political parties and their presidential candidates, signed the second national peace accord, with a promise not only to ensure peaceful polls but also to accept the outcome.
Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu, Mr. Peter Obi, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, Alhaji Musa Kwankwaso and others signed the peace pact, at the International Conference Centre, Abuja.
The event was organised by the respected National Peace Committee, NPC, headed by former Head of State, General Abdulsalami Abubakar, retd, in conjunction with the Kukah Centre.
The National Peace Committee (NPC) is a non-governmental initiative conceptualized in 2014 in response to emerging threats occasioned by the 2015 general elections. It is an initiative made up of eminent elder statesmen who undertake efforts to support free, fair and credible elections as well as intervene in critical issues of national concern through high-level mediated and alternative dispute resolution mechanisms.
At inception, the NPC had an urgent, broad based mandate to make modest contributions towards a smooth and peaceful conduct of the 2015 elections, devoid of any breakdown of law and order before, during and after the electioneering process.
Consequently, NPC’s core mandate is: To observe and monitor compliance with Abuja Accord signed by the political parties during elections; to provide advice to the Government and INEC on resolution of political disputes and conflicts arising from issues of compliance with the Abuja Accord; to make itself available for national mediation and conciliation in the case of post-electoral disputes or crises; to ensure peaceful outcome of General Elections that is acceptable to a generality of Nigerians and the international community.
It could also be recalled that in his goodwill message at the well-attended event of signing the peace accord, President Muhammadu Buhari, charged the contestants and their political parties to respect the choice of voters and accept the result of the elections as announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, the agency empowered by law to do so.
Beyond President Buhari’s well thought out charge to contestants and their political parties to respect the choice of voters and accept the result of the elections as announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, the emerging consensus is that the National Peace Committee (NPC) itself must now prevail on Atiku Abubakar, Peter Obi and Kwankwaso to congratulate the winner of the presidential contest Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu.
This is of course without prejudice to the actions as prescribed by law that these gentlemen have taken in seeking the judicial option of resolving some of the doubts they may habour concerning the election.
From its foundational mandate, the NPC is positioned, given the preponderance of elder statesmen peopling it ranks, to step up and intervene in the subsisting ‘stalemate’ – for want of a better term – and prevail on Atiku, Obi and Kwankwaso to congratulate the winner.
The NPC envisages a Nigeria that is built on peace where every citizen has the right to democratic participation and can live freely in any part of the country, contributing to its growth, development and stability. Hence its direct engagement with the front-running presidential contestants who lost will go a long way in reining in undue rebellion and potentially disruptive distabilisation of the polity.
As an initiative made up of eminent elder statesmen committed to supporting rancour-free and fair elections as well as ready to intervene in critical issues of national concern through high-level mediated and alternative dispute resolution mechanisms, their positions on issues related to their mandate are important. They should reach out to the politicians who perhaps may naturally feel alienated after losing the contest.
It worth recalling NPC leader Abdulsalam Abubakar’s counsel to politicians and their platforms: “I want to encourage political parties to recognise and respect that only INEC has the constitutional authority to announce the results and to ensure that their supporters refrain from disseminating fake news, misinformation, and disinformation and avoid statements that will incite violence after the results of the elections have been announced.” INEC has effectuated this electoral management mandate and it shouldn’t generate undue rancour.
According a member of NPC and former Head of State, General Yakubu Gowon, retd, “The National Peace Committee positioning itself as a reliable, dependable independent mediation institution that seeks to foster and show peace in Nigeria’s elections since 2015. I thank the members of the Peace Committee for their faith in Nigeria and the tireless effort in working to keep this country together and viable.”
Cut to the bone, it is time for the NPC to mediate and return the polity to an even keel ahead of the swearing in of the president-elect
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