Political tensions rose dramatically in Nigeria today ahead of President Olusegun Obasanjo's re-election bid, with opposition parties rejecting the official results of parliamentary polls as fraudulent.
Three days after the polls in Africa's most populous state, allegations of intimidation, violence and vote rigging in many regions were still coming.
Official results from the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) slowed to a trickle, stoking fears that it will struggle to conduct the key presidential vote on April 19. "INEC is laying a foundation for political anarchy in the country," opposition politician Ahmad Mahmoud told journalists in northeastern Adamawa state.
Saturday's national vote was the first in the oil-producing country of more than 120 million people since Obasanjo's election in 1999 ended 15 years of military rule. More than a score of parties held crisis talks in Abuja, the capital, as Obasanjo's ruling party extended its commanding lead in results announced so far for the National Assembly.
"Our conclusion is that the election as conducted by INEC was very flawed and the figures declared are very, very spurious," Don Etiebet, spokesman for the parties, told Reuters. "So we have rejected the election results in totality.
We have asked INEC to remedy the situation," he said.
Nigeria's 60 million voters are due to return to the polls on Saturday to elect 36 state governors and the president. Obasanjo is running for a second four-year term at the helm of one of the world's biggest oil producers. Etiebet, chairman of the main opposition All Nigeria People's Party (ANPP), did not call for a boycott of the presidential vote and said INEC could resolve the crisis.
"They know what to do to conduct a free and fair election that will be acceptable to all the parties," he said. Charges of foul play also echoed from Obasanjo's southwestern homebase in the Yoruba heartland. Yoruba leader Abraham Adesanya said he and five opposition governors of the region were preparing a common position on charges of poll irregularities.
"From reports we got from all the governors and leaders of the region, it would appear we had that in abundance," Adesanya told Reuters after shock PDP poll victories in the area. Fury over unexpected PDP wins sparked a rampage by youths on Tuesday in Katsina, homebase of Obasanjo's main rival Muhammadu Buhari in the largely Islamic north, local residents said.
They said mobs burned down the home of Obasanjo's leading political ally in Katsina, Lawal Kaita, and that of another associate in the nearby town of Malumfashi. Police in the area could not be reached immediately for confirmation. Both Buhari and Obasanjo are former army generals who ruled Nigeria in the past as military leaders.