By DADA AYOKHAI
Despite the numerous imperfections recorded during the just concluded presidential and national Assembly elections, there are quite a lot of talking points about its outcome which will go down as a major upset in the political history of Edo State
One of the major takeaways of the election was the massive trouncing the ruling Peoples Democratic Party received at the hands of the opposition.
Since the dawn of our nascent democracy in 1999, the Edo State PDP has always produced National Assembly members and also scored the highest votes in the presidential election.
All that has however changed as the results of the presidential and National Assembly election, held on Saturday, February 25, as declared by the INEC, showed a dismal performance, the worst of its kind since the party was formed in 1999.
The 2023 Presidential and National Assembly election results have broken barriers and set new records. One of them is the fact that this is the first time in the history of the party that it would simultaneously fail to deliver its presidential candidate as well as win any seat in both the upper and lower chambers of the National Assembly.
Such a disastrous outing for a political party that claims to be deep-rooted among the voting public is disgraceful and inexcusable. Added to it is the fact that it happened under the watch of the state governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki
Even more worrisome is the fact that the presidential standard bearer of the party, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, came in a distant third behind the relatively new LP and the APC and also failed to secure the required 25 percent of the votes cast
According to the results for Edo State released by the INEC, the PDP presidential candidate scored a paltry 89, 585 votes compared to the 331, 163 votes recorded for the Labour Party
Political pundits have placed the blame for the ruinous outing squarely on the shoulder of the state governor. They contend that Gov Obaseki exhibited traits of covetousness and egotism that are common among politicians by sticking to the winner takes all mentality rather than the politics of inclusion.
They further argued that after his defection, along with his deputy and followers, he resisted every attempt to foster unity in the party via the harmonization of the various tendencies inside the party. Such refusals, they intended, are what has resulted in its woeful performance at the presidential and national assembly polls.
