By Emmanuel Aziken, Political Editor, Tony Edike and Demola Akinyemi

Governor Sullivan Chime of Enugu State has won approval from near and wide for his respect of the sacredness of the democratic structures of the local governments in his state.
He is perhaps an exception among his gubernatorial colleagues, being that Enugu State under his administration has not taken the undemocratic course of appointing local government administrators or caretaker committees in aberration to the provisions of section 7 of the constitution.

Gov. Chime

Compared with some states, Enugu shines as gold. Across the border in Anambra State is the inglorious reputation of sorts. Anambra under Governor Peter Obi’s nearly eight years in power has not conducted a local government election.

The record in repugnance for democracy at the local government level which he inherited from his predecessors many stakeholders from the state say, has been taken to a height which peraphs no other governor can beat. Dr. Chris Ngige and Governor Chinwoke Mbadiniju before him, did not also conduct local government elections putting Anambra State as the only state in the country never to have conducted a local government election since the inception of democratic rule in 1999.

Governor Chime’s shinning example nonetheless, the local government election holding in Enugu tomorrow is already laced in controversy. The major opposition political party in the state, the All Progressives Congress, APC has been precluded from the contest, putting a credibility question to the otherwise commendable contest.

The exclusion of parties has become the latest instrument with which ruling political parties in the states are using to dominate or intimidate the local opposition around them.
It was a totally ingenious story of political oppression in Kwara State last weekend when the Kwara State Independent Electoral Commission, KWSIEC conducted local government elections in the state.

The APC chapter in that state was in dire straits after it was sidelined in the council upon the ruling of the court that the party did not meet electoral qualifications to participate in the local government polls. The PDP won all chairmanship and councillorship positions on offer in the poll.

Comrade Adams Oshomole

It was a similar story in Cross River State when the Cross River State Electoral Commission, CRSIEC conducted elections into the local councils in that state at the ending of September. The PDP which rules the state not unexpectedly won all chairmanship and councillorship positions in the election.

The oppressor and the victims were, however, reversed in Edo State penultimate Tuesday when elections into the local governments drew to an end with the rerun election for Esan Northeast local government council.

The state chapter of the PDP had sought to disqualify the APC from presenting a candidate upon the claim that the APC was not a participant in the earlier election that was declared inconclusive last April. It was a thought that was quickly perished given the APC’s control of the state administration.
The result of the poll has, however, become a matter of interest to democracy stakeholders upon allegations that the APC candidates who lost in the chairmanship and councillorship contests were sworn-in after elections allegedly doctored were announced in the state capital.
The APC in Kwara State had taken the KWSIEC to court to stop it from conducting the election last weekend upon the fact that the party was not recognized to partake in the polls upon provisions that the party did not meet the 90 day limit required of parties to exist before participating in an election under the electoral act.

Section 84 (2) of the electoral act requires a party to be in existence 90 days before an election.
Justice Sulaiman Kawu of the state High Court delivering a judgment on the interlocutory injunction filed to stop the election said the applicant, the All Progressives Congress (APC), failed to meet the requirements to stop the election.
For this reason, the judge ruled, “the application is hereby dismissed”.

But the interim APC Chairman in the state, Comrade Sola Iji described Saturday’s election as a contest between “PDP and PDP”, saying it was not a popular election.
According to him, “We have listened to the decision of the court in the application. What we expect is that opportunity should be given to all the political parties to participate in the election. That was why we came with this application in the first instance, that was why we came to the court in the first instance.

“Unfortunately this is a contest and it is going to remain a contest between the PDP and PDP. It is not a contest to test the popularity of political parties in the state but an election that is going to be conducted purely for PDP”.
In Cross River State where the local government elections were conducted on September 21 without the APC, the same argument was used in excluding the APC.
It had been envisaged that the merged parties in the APC as a combination would for once give the PDP a stiff opposition in the poll, but that was averted after the courts upheld the decision of the CRSIEC to exclude the APC from the polls on the eve of the elections.
The exclusion of the APC in the election coming up tomorrow in Enugu was, however, another tale. All of the party’s chairmanship candidates were excluded following what the chairman of the Enugu Independent Electoral Commission, ENSIEC, Dr. Boniface Eneh described as their failure to present their tax clearance certificates.

While the PDP has been largely seen as the oppressor in Enugu, Kwara and Cross River, in Edo State the APC has also been accused by the PDP of using its control of the state administration to forcefully have its way in the 18 local councils in the state.
At the end of the local government elections in April the APC cleared all 17 chairmanship seats in an election that the PDP described as well below average. The same scenario repeated itself penultimate Tuesday at the rerun polls in Esan Northeast local government area, the base of the chairman of the PDP Board of Trustees, Chief Tony Anenih.

At the end of the polls, the PDP based on what it claimed as collated results from the wards claimed victory in the chairmanship contest. However, while they were celebrating their ‘victory’, the Edo State Independent Electoral Commission, EDSIEC was announcing the ACN candidate in the state capital as the winner of the election!