BY ROTIMI DUROJAIYE
President Muhammadu Buhari’s counsel to the National Working Committee of the All Progressives Congress to ensure that the party’s tickets were not given to the highest bidders were ignored last Wednesday, as its National Executive Committee approved N100 million as cost of Presidential nomination forms.
According to the schedule of fees for expression of interest and nomination forms released by the NWC, governorship is N50 million, Senate N20 million, House of Representatives N10 million, while state House of Assembly aspirants would purchase theirs at N2 million.
The N100 million for Presidential nomination form is over 100 per cent increase from the amount it sold the form for the same office in 2018 at N45 million; and nearly 200 per cent hike from N27 million it sold forms in 2014.
The N100 million fee is also more than double the fee of the major opposition Peoples Democratic Party, which fixed its Presidential nomination form at N40 million.
The NEC also revealed that it would begin selling the nomination and expression of interest forms for various electoral offices from Saturday, April 23 until May 6, 2022.
Unfortunately, the sale of expression of interest and nomination forms for electoral positions slated for Saturday did not take place as it was postponed.
This was because the contractor responsible for printing the forms did not deliver at the agreed time.
No new date had been fixed for the sale of forms, but it was gathered at the weekend that the NWC will determine the new date on Monday.
The party had not yet perfected its procedures for the sale of the forms and the primary elections slated to run from May 18 to June 1, 2022.
The N100 million set by the APC for aspirants seeking to run for president is far higher than the four-year salaries of President Buhari and Vice President Osinbajo.
With the current salary of the President, which is put at N14.058 million yearly or N1.171 million monthly, according to a breakdown by the Revenue Mobilisation, Allocation and Fiscal Commission, it means that the N100 million APC nomination form is the salary of the President for about 85 months or seven years.
For the Vice President who currently earns N12.126 million yearly or N1.01 million monthly, the N100 million nomination form is his salary for 99 months or eight years and three months.
Reacting to the cost of the nomination form, rights group, the Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria, urged the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission and the Independent Corrupt and Other Related Offences Commission to probe the source of wealth of any presidential aspirant who picks the APC presidential nomination and expression of interest forms.
The group made this known in a statement by its National Coordinator, Emmanuel Onwubiko. The group said only corrupt politicians would afford that much for a nomination form.
HURIWA said, “Anyone who buys the nomination form at such a scandalous amount should be arrested and handed over to law enforcement agencies such as EFCC or ICPC or the Nigeria Police Force for investigation on the source of the money.
“We only just finished carpeting the opposition PDP for bastardising the process of nominating its presidential candidate by inflating the cost of its nomination form to N40 million, little did we know that the politicians who run the Federal Government and have ruined the national economy will peg theirs at the extravagant cost of N100 million.
“This same APC government is unable to meet the funding obligations for federal universities and thereby has left millions of students of public schools to roam around in their homes due to industrial strike by university teachers for over two months.
“It is a shame that those who seek to govern Nigeria are made to cough out so much money to purchase forms just to signpost their original intention as persons whose only objective would be to first recoup their huge investments and to further impoverish the citizenry.”
Also describing the cost of APC form as shameful, another rights group, the Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre, called on all Nigerians to condemn money politics.
“We are the ruling party, the largest party in Africa, a party where if you pick their nomination form and you are the candidate, the probability of you becoming the elected person for that position is almost hundred per cent
“
In a statement by Executive Director, CISLAC/Chairman, Transition Monitoring Group, Auwal Ibrahim Musa (Rafsanjani), the body said: “It is shameful that the ruling party, that the President belongs to, has endorsed the expression of interest and nomination forms for its presidential ticket at N100 million. This is especially at a time when many have expressed dissatisfaction with the level of youth participation in partisan politics and called for deliberate measures to create the enabling environment for wider inclusion and active participation of women and youths in politics and governance of the country.
“A key question to ask is, ‘who can legally afford N100 million for a Presidential ambition?’ This despicable decision by the APC begs this question as it only serves within the following contexts to marginalise youths, women and average citizens.
“Despite claims of a 50 per cent reduction in nomination fees for women and youths, it clearly shows that N50 million remains higher than the 2019 Presidential aspirant fee, which was N45 million. This will apparently exclude the youths, women and average Nigerians who have clamoured to improve opportunities to exercise their rights to declare their interests and contest in the elections.”
National Chairman of the PDP, Iyorchia Ayu, and former Governor of Cross River State, Clement Ebri, also condemned the high nomination cost for elective offices announced by APC.
Human rights activist and lawyer, Mike Ozekhome, similarly criticized APC for “corrupting democracy” with the high nomination fee, saying the N100 million fixed for its presidential nomination form “rightly sent shock waves of righteous indignation across the country.”
However, following public outrage over the high cost of nomination forms for aspirants in the APC, the ruling party on Thursday explained that the fee was pegged at the rate was needed to lock out unserious contenders.
APC National Women Leader, Beta Edu, featuring on a live television programme, said the high rate of the ruling party’s nomination forms was to curtail the activities of persons with jokey ambitions.
Edu said the APC NWC had consciously fixed the rate as part of a mechanism to ensure only serious aspirants were on the ballot.
She said the ruling party could not afford to waste time, especially considering the fact that it was working in line with the timetable of the Independent National Electoral Commission.
Edu stated, “Everywhere around the world, running for elections has never been cheap and the party must be able to have means to guard several other issues that may arise. You find people who are not interested in running for elections just standing up, picking up forms and just waiting to constitute a kind of barrier or put a stud in the entire process as it goes on.
“These are not things that we want to see as a party. We are the ruling party, the largest party in Africa, a party where if you pick their nomination form and you are the candidate, the probability of you becoming the elected person for that position is almost hundred per cent.
“So, we cannot afford to dabble or joke around or gamble around. We want only serious people who are interested in running and representing different people to run.”
APC’s defence of the price of its nomination forms came as Chairman of The Progressive Project and senator for Kano South, Kabiru Gaya, expressed confidence in Vice President Yemi Osinbajo’s candidacy.
Gaya said, unlike the moneybags, Osinbajo’s popularity would facilitate the pooling of his supporters’ token donations to raise the N100 million nomination fees for his presidential bid.
Similarly, barely a few hours after the APC leadership announced the sale of its presidential nominations form, the Director General, Tinubu Support Organisation, Aminu Suleiman, signed a cheque to purchase the form for the former Lagos governor, Tinubu.
Suleiman, a Kebbi-born multinational contractor, in a message on the support group platform, reiterated his belief in the capacity of Tinubu to positively transform Nigeria as President.
The message reads, “Asiwaju has helped, raised and lifted lots of people and he is a man with a kind heart. The only thing I can do right now is to buy the N100 million APC Presidential Expression of Interest Form and Nomination Form for my father and mentor.”
An award-winning journalist, writer, analyst and researcher with a background in media production, politics and business, David Hundeyin said we need to talk about how expensive Nigerian elections are.
According to Hundeyin, it is estimated that the cost of a frontline presidential campaign in the U.S. now sits somewhere between $500 million and $1 billion.
“Assuming an exchange rate of N580 – $1, this means that it costs anything from N290bn to N580bn to become the president of the United States. In Nigeria comparatively, such figures are not available due to an absence of public declaration requirements for political campaigns. All we have to go on are the numbers that can be approximated from estimating total media buys, campaign tour expenditure, and lobbying expenses.”
The expert stated that in the 2015 presidential election, which was thought to be the most expensive election in Nigeria’s history to date, it was estimated that the two frontline parties (APC and PDP) spent nothing less than N5bn each on primaries, delegates, media buying, and campaign expenses alone.
In his words, “This figure is arrived at by aggregating industry figures from the media and advertising industry alongside estimates for expenses like printing posters, lobbying primary delegates, paying election day party agents, use of foreign strategic communications entities like AKPD Media and Message, and undeclared under-the-table expenses for illegal efforts like vote-buying and election day bribery, which are hidden but substantial.
“In absolute and proportional terms, the cost of running a successful American electoral campaign is much higher than in Nigeria, but the key metric that should be used for comparison is the sheer difference in per capita income.
“Whereas the US has a per capita income touching $60,000 per year, that of Nigeria stays stuck stubbornly at $2,000 per year. What this means is that the US economy is structured to be able to afford and absorb such a high cost of politics and elections. Nigeria on the other hand absolutely does not have the facilities for this.
“In other words, our very system of changing power is what itself guarantees that the majority of government funds earmarked for development continue to vanish into black holes. Nigeria is too poor for politics to cost so much.”
Hundeyin noted that whoever intends to win an election in Nigeria without keeping the entire process generously lubricated with wads of naira and dollar bills from the point of declaring; to the primaries; to the election itself; to the inevitable election results tribunal, might as well be trying to shoot at Boko Haram positions with a water pistol.
“Money is needed to confer with the kinsmen before you can declare for the election. Money is what turns that declaration into a spot on the ballot at the party primary elections. Money is what wins the primaries and the inevitable court challenge to that win. Money is what prints tens of thousands of full-colour posters, t-shirts, stationery, and promotional materials. Money is what pays the creative agencies and the media for the TV ads, the radio jingles, and the print and online ads. Money is what keeps the party agents stationed at the polling booths on Election Day to prevent any hanky panky by INEC. “Money is what mobilises police and occasionally soldiers to defend the sanctity of the elections where the opponent may have decided to employ the electoral dark arts of disrupting the vote in one’s stronghold.
“The problem with all this is not the inherent greed, selfishness, and myopia that it creates in the politicking and electoral process. To be sure, those are problems in their own right, but the elephant in the room is that money is never simply wasted on such a large scale every 4 years with no return or expectation of return. That is not how capital behaves, and whether the capital has been invested in a stock or in a winning electoral candidate, returns are expected on the investment. In the case of Nigeria, such “returns” can only be fraudulent or inflated contracts awards and kickbacks, results of influence peddling, proceeds of tenderpreneurship and official cronyism, and every other type of public sector corruption we are accustomed to.
“In other words, our very system of changing power is what itself guarantees that the majority of government funds earmarked for development continue to vanish into black holes. While most Nigerians have little access to mains power supply, a few will inexplicably continue to run into cash windfalls that buy property in Dubai and London after every election – the very system of choosing leaders guarantees it.”
In Nigeria, INEC rules officially prohibit corporate bodies from donating to campaigns and restrict individual contributions to N1, 000,000. The rules also restrict the amount of money a presidential candidate may spend on their campaign to N1bn; a gubernatorial candidate to N200m; a senatorial candidate to N40m; a House of Representatives candidate to N10m, and a state House of Assembly candidate to N10m.
According to Hundeyin, since such rules are impossible to enforce and are too easy to get around, the entire mechanism of political campaigning and party primaries needs to be rethought.
“I believe that in this internet age, there is little reason why political parties must hold an event called a “national convention” where several bags of naira and dollar notes briskly make their clandestine way around,” he stressed.
A politician, who does not want his name in print, also lamented the high cost of elections in Nigeria.
He said expensive elections in a nation where 70.8% of her people are living below one dollar per day and 92.4% on less than two dollars a day is a major source of corruption.
“He said expensive elections in a nation where 70.8% of her people are living below one dollar per day and 92.4% on less than two dollars a day is a major source of corruption
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“On the condition that governance is not the only unreasonable source of income in Nigeria, many Nigerians would not have been killing themselves to access political power. As it is in Nigeria, poor people—who are willing to serve can never have an access to party tickets, let alone being given an opportunity to serve. To buy nomination forms, delegates and electorates is not what the poor can handle, it is only for the rich—who are going to recoup in the days to come,” he noted.
He said the biggest and bloodiest grubby-field of money in Nigeria is politics.
“Four years ago, Nigerians thought there was a clear departure from the old order of monkeyshines, tomfoolery and bloodletting within the confines of politics, but it is now clear as water that the APC and PDP are two sides of a coin.
“If you do not know, kindly do know that Nigeria’s elections are among the most expensive in the world, with the cost soaring (as an eagle) from a little above N1 billion in 1999 to over N100 billion in 2015.
“The country’s huge cost of elections has surpassed that of the world’s largest democracy, India, with a population six times bigger than that of our own population.
“Also, Nigeria, with 67 million registered voters—spent $625 million during the 2015 elections, translating into $9.33 per voter, according to data prepared by the National Institute for Legislative Studies (NILS) in 2015. And this is happening in a very poor economy.
“Four years ago, the APC and PDP made N3.8 billion from the sale of election forms. The nomination and expression of interest forms were put at N5.5 million with the nomination form costing N5million, while the expression of interest cost N500, 000. With this cost, the party did make N198 million from the sale of forms.
“In 2014, the cost for the APC nomination and expression of interest forms for its presidential ticket was N27.5 million and the governorship ticket was N5.5 million. Sitting governorship aspirants are to pay N10.5 million while sitting senators are to pay N5.3 million while fresh senatorial aspirants are to pay N3.3 million.
“Let me single out the issue of nomination and expression of interest forms for the APC presidential and governorship tickets which were N27.5 and N5.5 million. These and more are happening in a nation where 92.4% of her people are living below two dollars. If the poor man is not going to either steal or borrow money from those who are going to control him in the days to come as we have been witnessing since the baby of democracy was put to bed again in 1999.
“Please understand to me that it takes a kismet and fortune to become a president in modern day Nigeria. After buying the party nomination and expression of interest forms, you’d still need to buy some territorial holders, party delegates and teeming electorates. And who would do all these things without wanting to recoup in the days to come? This is our major source of corruption in Nigeria.
“For now, there is no president that can fight corruption in our climate, even if he spends 100 years in power. The only way to reduce corruption in Nigeria is to first make the pool of our elections very easy for the poor, unknown, and voiceless men (women) to swim in.
“Until our elections become very cheap and affordable for those who are very rich in values (and probably not rich in cash) to step into, rogues, heartless and trigger-happy rich men and women—would continue to dominate both our corridors of power, streets, villages and towns. Elections in Nigeria are not about values, they are about blood-money. And because money is the one that is calling the shots in our own version of politics, our land can’t but be soaked with blood as we are having it today.”
