By Miftaudeen Raji 

President and Founder of Anap Foundation, Atedo Peterside said President Muhammadu Buhari has improved the chances of free, fair and credible elections in Nigeria with the signing of the new Electoral Act 2022. 

Peterside stated this while speaking in an interview on Arise Television on Wednesday.

He said, “You are not doing government for nothing. Buhari’s legacy must be to deliver free and fair elections. Already some of us praise Buhari, and I must say that because I have condemned almost of Buhari’s policies on the economic side. 

“But, I have to commend him (Buhari) the Electoral Act. That has improved our chances of a free and fair election. In terms of legacy, we can follow that by delivering a free and fair election actually. That’s the role of that Act. Perhaps that may be his enduring legacy,” he added. 

Recall that Anap Foundation has commissioned series of opinion polls, which was conducted by NOI Polls Limited (NOIPolls) ahead of the February 25 presidential election.

After the polls, the flag bearer of the Labour Party, LP, Peter Obi maintained a lead in the third and final nationwide poll concluded in the first half of February 2023 followed two earlier polls carried in September and December 2022.

The result of the fresh poll was released last Wednesday by Peterside.

In a statement,  Anap said, “For the avoidance of doubt, it is pertinent to mention that the methodology used by NOI polls is almost the exact same methodology that was used in previous presidential polls that they handled for us in 2011, 2015 and 2019.

“In all those past presidential polls, the front-runner that was identified by our polls ended up winning the elections, irrespective of a rather large percentage of voters who were undecided and/or refused to indicate who their preferred candidate was.

“We have also applied the exact same methodology in our various governorship polls carried out in 2011, 2014, 2015, 2019 and 2022 and the methodology generally held up well.”

Anap said its third and final poll result in February 2023 showed that Obi of the Labour Party remains in the lead, with Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) both trailing him while Rabiu Kwankwaso of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) emerged as the “lone outsider”.