One Year After 2023 Poll: Ensuring Credibility in Future Elections

Today marks exactly one year of the hotly contested February 23, 2023 presidential election.

Arguably the toughest and most controversial, the poll was the first three-horse race for the presidency.

The winner, President Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress, APC and his two other major challenges, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP; and Mr. Peter Obi of the Labour. Party, LP, fought all the way to the Supreme Court.

On Friday, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, said the 2023 polls were one of the best in the annals of balloting in Nigeria despite the technical glitch that marred the electronic transmission of the presidential election results.

The most profound assurance by the electoral body was that technology would be deployed in the accreditation of eligible voters, and the transmission of election results from the polling units directly to the INEC IREV portal, which would enable the public to follow the outcome of the elections real-time. All candidates for the elections launched out in the most robust and aggressive campaigns ever witnessed in Nigeria to win the support of Nigerians.

It is on record that there has never been any previous general election in Nigeria that was ever so hotly contested in the law courts as the 2023 general election. The tension and fear of the breakdown of law and order in the country remained palpable until the Supreme Court finally resolved the presidential election petition filed by some of the presidential candidates that contested the election in favour of President Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress, APC. Nigeria has never been scandalized this much since 1999.

The current economic hardship our country is facing also stems from the legitimacy crisis that arose from the presidential election. Our government has not been able to summon the courage to say no to the biddings of the Bretton Woods institutions, which has led to the removal of whatever little and rare welfare services the poor gets from the government in the name of fuel subsidy.

On its part, the Labour Party, LP, described the results of the 2023 presidential election as announced by the INEC as the worst electoral heist in modern history.


National Publicity Secretary of the party, Obiora Ifoh, in an interview with Sunday Vanguard, said: “The 2023 poll as conducted by the Prof. Mahmood Yakubu-led INEC can best be described as the worst in recent memory.

The election management body promised a lot but delivered little if anything. It was an election where the hopes and aspiration of Nigerians were dashed in broad day light.

People were mobilized, they came out and voted based on promises of transparency made by INEC. At the end of the day, the man and the party which urged its supporters to ‘grab, snatch and run with the mandate’ were declared winners under the cover of night. It was a case of while men slept, their mandate was stolen.

One year after the electoral heist (2023 poll), we are still here. As Nigerians we all can best answer the question whether or not our lives are better or worse.