As the Supreme Court of Nigeria prepares to hear and deliver the final judgement on the disputed Bayelsa State governorship election this month, there is noticeable tension in the state. The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared Henry Seriake Dickson, candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), winner of the election conducted on December 5 and 6 2015 and January 9, 2016.
The declaration is being challenged by Timipre Sylva, candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC). Sylva’s contention is that Dickson did not win the election according to the rules guiding the electoral process. However, the Bayelsa State Governorship Election Tribunal and the Court of Appeal dismissed Sylva’s case and reaffirmed Dickson as duly elected. Convinced that the two lower courts were wrong, the APC candidate petitioned the highest court in the land.
The social and political heat in the state has its roots in the actions and inactions of the incumbent governor. Firstly, Dickson has been boasting publicly that his victory at the polls was a bootstrap operation. As such, he owes no one any political debt. This, perhaps, explains why government workers in the state are being owed their salaries for several months. In fact, the practice now in the state is payment of half salaries that are also irregular. It is so bad that civil servants find it difficult to know the exact details of their outstanding remunerations. To make matters worse, Dickson even proposed to send an Executive Bill to the Bayelsa State House of Assembly to make payment of half salary a law in the state.
Secondly – and more importantly – Dickson and his group have shown breath-taking disregard for truth and reason. This they did before, during and after the elections. They carried the same attitude over to every stage of the court process.
At present, the Dickson group makes three main claims. First, they say Sylva has no case at the Supreme Court. According to this claim, Dickson won the election in seven out of the eight local government areas in the state. They conveniently forget that Sylva is in court to prove that Dickson’s victory was farcical, fraudulent and invalid.
Take the case of Southern Ijaw Local Government Area that is key to resolving this matter. In that local government, the election was rescheduled to hold on December 6, 2015. It did take place but was cancelled on December 7, 2015 by the Bayelsa State Resident Electoral Commissioner. Sylva’s case is that the REC has no powers under the law to annul an election that has taken place. The non-governmental organisation, Centre for Transparent Justice, based in Yenagoa captured it best in a recent publication.
“Sylva’s question to the court amounts to this: can an election which has been concluded at the unit and ward levels be annulled while collation is on-going at the local government level? In other words, can a football match be cancelled after the goals have been scored? When did the cancellation take place? On the 7th of December 2015. Meanwhile election was on the 6th of December 2015. If the election was marred by violence, why was it not cancelled while the ‘violence’ was taking place? Why was the election cancelled after the election had taken place – a day after? There was no violence during the collation of the results at the local government level,” the NGO stated. Still on the “Sylva-has-no-case” claim is the position that because Sylva’s case was dismissed at both the Tribunal and the Appeal Court, he would lose at the Supreme Court. Not only is that claim semi-literate. It is rash and irresponsible. If it were to be valid, there would have been no need for the apex court. Being the court of last instance, the Supreme Court is not bound by the judgement of the lower courts.
Second, the Dickson group claims Sylva is relying on the Federal Government and its key officials to intimidate the judges and get judgement in his favour. This is an old claim. During the elections, Dickson kept shouting about Sylva using federal might to rig the process. As it turned out, he was the one who bullied his way to victory. In doing so, he threatened the Federal Government and its institutions, including the Presidency. He even incited the Ijaws against President Muhammadu Buhari and the government at the centre. Even on the night of December 5th 2015 Election, against all electoral laws and norms, Dickson personally led thugs to the state collation centre to threaten and intimidate INEC officials. He had his way.
Shortly before the tribunal judgement, the Dickson group was all over the place shouting that Sylva had reached out to the wife of the President, Mrs Aisha Buhari, the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mallam Abubakar Malami (SAN), the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Engr. Babachir David Lawal, and other officials of the Federal Government to compromise the election tribunal in order to declare him governor. At a point, they even said the APC National Leader, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, had guaranteed Sylva victory. At the end of the day, the tribunal ruled in favour of Dickson.
The day after that judgement, which Sylva dismissed as biased, Governor Dickson visited President Buhari at the Presidential Villa, Abuja. After the visit, Dickson praised Buhari for not meddling in Bayelsa’s political process.
“The President never had anything to do by way of negatively influencing of the last general elections in Bayelsa and also the outcome of the Tribunal proceedings,” Dickson said on July 27, 2016. “That is important because if our nation must move forward, if our democracy must be strengthened, if our nation must move forward, if our democracy must be strengthened, if our nation must be stable, then institutions must be allowed to grow.”
Before the Appeal Court gave its ruling on September 22, 2016, Dickson and his group had also accused Sylva of influencing the choice of the panel of judges, saying they were all from APC-controlled states. One report even quoted a pro-Dickson group as saying the Chairman of the Court of Appeal panel on the Bayelsa election, Justice Jimi Olukayode Bada, was a personal friend of Sylva. The group claimed it was Bada who as a federal high court judge in 2011 gave the judgement elongating Sylva’s tenure as Bayelsa governor before the Supreme Court upturned it in January 2012. There was zero truth to the group’s claim. In any case, the Appeal panel upheld Dickson’s election in a judgement, which many see as worse than that of the Tribunal.
Third, the Dickson group claims that following the nomination of a new Chief Justice of Nigeria to succeed Justice Mahmud Mohammed on November 10, 2016, Sylva has been assured of a positive judgement. In this thinking, the Presidency is said to have instructed the incoming CJN to nullify Dickson’s victory, and order a fresh election. Again, this claim is wrong. Sylva is asking the court to declare him as the rightful governor. A new governorship election is merely an alternative prayer.
Assuming a deal exists, as the Dickson group alleges, why would any sane person leave his main prayer for the second option? It is curious that this issue of a fresh election in Bayelsa is gaining currency within the Dickson group. Last week, Governor Dickson approached the Bayelsa State House of Assembly with a Supplementary Appropriation Bill seeking N20 billion, ostensibly, for project development in the Ministries of Works and Health. The word on the street in Yenagoa is that the money is for a new election. How did they come about this? Is there something they know than most of us about the case at the Supreme Court? How do they expect to source the funds?
Sadly, answers to these questions may never be known to those outside the Dickson syndicate.
Written by Dr. Mabota Alata, a Governance and Development expert based in Abuja.
