Insight How Obi’s emergence cost Atiku Nigeria’s presidency

On March 1, 2023, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Tinubu, the winner of the February 25 presidential election. Tinubu polled a total of 8.79 million votes to defeat 17 other candidates who also contested the number one position in Nigeria.

The result released by the electoral body shows that Atiku Abubakar of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) scored 6.98 million, taking the second position. Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP) polled 6.1 million votes, coming third in the race. 

Although both the candidate of the PDP and the LP have decided to challenge the outcome of the election in court, Dataphyte’s analysis of the result released by INEC shows that the performance of LP in the just-concluded election cost PDP its chances of taking power from the APC at the federal level. 

A further analysis reveals that if the LP sustains its current momentum,  it may further dampen the chances of the PDP winning the presidential election in subsequent elections.

Since Nigeria’s return to democracy in 1999, the country’s presidency has rotated largely between two political parties, the PDP (now in opposition since 2015) and the ruling APC. However, this narrative changed in the recently conducted presidential election with the emergence of Peter Obi, the standard bearer of the LP, who not only made the presidential election a three-horse race but also ate PDP’s lunch.

Dataphyte’s analysis of Nigeria’s election data, particularly in the last two general elections, reveals this.

For instance, in the 2015 presidential election, the northern region (North-Central, North-East, and North-West) voted overwhelmingly for the APC. The party won in 16 out of the 19 states that make up the region, polling 11.30 million votes from these states alone. 

In 2019, the APC won in 15 out of the 19 states in the region, polling a total of 10.03 million votes. In both elections, APC won the majority of the states in the South-West region -five in 2015 and four in 2019. Thus, these regions could be considered the strongholds of the APC.

In the 2015 Presidential election, PDP won in only three Northern states (Nassarawa, Plateau, and Taraba) and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT). It was a similar trend in 2019. The party won in only four northern states (Adamawa, Benue, Plateau, Taraba) and the FCT. Given this situation, it could be said that the northern region is not exactly a stronghold of the party, neither the South-West region. In the 2015 election, PDP won in only one state  (Ekiti) in the South-West region. In 2019, it won in only two states — Ondo and Oyo.

The South-East and South-South regions, on the other hand, are seen as the strongholds of the PDP.

In the 2015 and 2019 general elections, the party won all eleven states in the region. In fact, since its formation in 1998, data show that PDP has always won in all the states in the South-East and South-South region, irrespective of the candidate on the ballot. 

In the 1999 and 2003 elections, the South-East and South-South region voted for Olusegun Obasanjo, who was the presidential candidate of the party. Similarly, in 2007 when Umaru Musa Yar’Adua was the presidential candidate, the party won all the states in both regions. In 2011 and 2015, Goodluck Jonathan, who was the standard bearer of the PDP, won all the states in the two regions. This trend also continued in 2019 when Atiku Abubakar was the presidential candidate. 

However, for the first time, the regions voted differently. As opposed to what it had been since 1999, all five states in the South-East region voted overwhelmingly for LP/Peter Obi in the 2023 general election.

In the 2023 election, PDP polled only 91,198 votes from the South-East region, against 2.46 million votes it polled in 2015 and 1.69 million in 2019.

The Labour party, on the other hand, polled 1.96 million votes from the South-East region. 

It is worth noting that PDP did not score up to 25 percent of the total votes cast in any of the South-East states.

The South-South region, which had also been a stronghold of the PDP since 1999, was also not spared. Unlike in the past, PDP did not win in all six states in the region. The party managed to win in only two states — Akwa-Ibom and Bayelsa. The LP won in three states while APC won in Rivers. 

The 2023 general election is the first time that APC won in any South-South state. 

Cumulatively, the PDP scored only 717,908 votes in the South-South region in the 2023 election, while the LP polled 1.21 million votes. 

In the 2015 and 2019 elections, PDP had 4.17 million and 2.23 million votes, respectively, from the region. 

In the North-Central, PDP won in Plateau State and the FCT both in the 2015 and 2019 general elections. But in the 2023 election, LP polled more votes, triumphing in both states which could also be considered a stronghold of the PDP. 

Although overall, PDP had more votes in the general election than LP, data show that Obi’s party ate PDP’s lunch which directly or indirectly affected Abubakar’s chances in the 2023 election. Abubakar admitted this, noting that the PDP lost a considerable number of votes to LP/Peter Obi. “It is a fact that he took our votes from the South-East and the South-South….” Atiku said during a press conference in Abuja.

A former House of Representatives aspirant, Mathew Ibeabuchi, explained that the PDP made a mistake by allowing Peter Obi to leave.

He explained that the two zones felt the PDP was no longer equitable “as men who said it was the turn of the North in 2015 refused to accept that it was the turn of the South in 2023. How time flies.”

He also cited Obi’s competence and the fact that he hailed from one of the two regions as an advantage over Atiku, adding that the support of the young people made it difficult for the two regions to jettison Obi.