Following allegations of ballot rigging in the recently concluded presidential elections, the Atiku Abubakar campaign council stated that Nigeria would become the next African country to annul a presidential election that resulted in the election of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate, Bola Tinubu, as president-elect.
Remember that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared Tinubu the winner of the election despite protests from opposition political parties, who have since gone to court to challenge the outcome.
INEC’s failure to electronically transmit election results from 176,606 polling units to a public portal, as required by the commission’s regulations and guidelines, was one of the grounds for dispute by the losing parties.
In a tweet, Daniel Bwala, a spokesperson for the Atiku campaign, expressed optimism that Nigeria’s February 25, 2023 presidential election will be annulled due to alleged ballot rigging.
He went on to say that Nigeria, following Kenya and Mali, would be the third African country to annul a presidential election.
Supreme Court Kenya annulled the presidential elections for the first time in Africa, this was what was said “This is indeed a very historic day for the people of Kenya and by extension to the people of the continent of Africa”,” said Bwala.
For the first time in the history of African democratization, a ruling has been made by a court nullifying irregular election of a president. It marked a watershed in the continent of Africa that democracy would survive. After that, the Supreme Court in Malawi followed suit. Nigeria is next, save this post, he added.
After Austria, the Maldives, and Russia, Kenya became the third country in the world and the first in Africa to annul a presidential election in 2017.
Despite some international observers rating the election as free and fair, the East African country’s Supreme Court declared President Uhuru Kenyatta’s re-election null and void.
Malawi’s former president, Peter Mutharika, was fired by a constitutional court after being declared the winner of the country’s 2019 presidential election.
The court declared the presidential election results null and void, citing evidence of irregularities, and ordered that new elections be held within 150 days. Mutharika was defeated by Lazarus Chakwera in the rematch.