A few days ago, a thread made the front page of Nairaland where it was stated that the US thinktank predicted that Goodluck Jonathan the incumbent president will win the 2015 Presidential elections.

However, the author of the report has now publicly stated that the report posted on Nairaland FP is erroneous and does not take into account the final outcomes of the report findings

Excerpts below:

My technical report for the Brookings Institution’s Africa Foresight publication on the 2015 presidential election entitled ‘The 2015 Elections in Nigeria: Issues and Challenges’, has become an issue between the PDP and the APC. As should be expected in an election year, one side wants to make a political capital out of the report, the other will not allow it to enjoy any political mileage from it. Supporters of President Jonathan had this screaming headline go viral on the internet: “US top think-tank, Brookings, projects Jonathan win; say APC is a fragile anti-Jonathan setup”.

For supporters of President Jonathan, Brookings Institution, regarded as the number one think-tank in the world, has predicted victory for Jonathan in the forthcoming presidential election.


APC supporters on the other hand derided the report as a mere “op-ed written by one Jideofor Adibe, who is a Senior Lecturer in Nasarawa State University”. They also concocted a headline, meant to be a counter narrative to the one abstracted out of context by supporters of PDP and also went viral with it on the internet. The APC’s own was: “US Top Think-tank, Brookings, disclaims controversial report predicting victory for Jonathan”.



Let me quote the portion of the report which has been doctored to suggest that Brookings predicted a Jonathan win:

“The APC gets much of its strength from tapping into anti-Jonathan sentiments in the Muslim north and grievances among the Yoruba who feel that the Jonathan administration has ignored them in key political appointments.

“Allegations of corruption against top PDP officials will be powerful ammunition in the hands of the APC, especially with the choice of Buhari, widely seen as not corrupt, as the party’s presidential candidate.

“The party is, however, a fragile one that seems united only in its quest to wrest the presidency from Jonathan or to have power ‘returned’ to the north. Though the election is expected to be very competitive, the odds still favour President Jonathan.”

It may be germane to make a few clarifications about the report by Brookings’ Africa Foresight.

Between 2013 and 2014 I was involved in a year-long research project by Brookings’ Africa Growth Initiative (AGI) on the impact of conflict on agriculture in Nigeria and Mali. For the Nigerian arm of the project, I provided the research on the conflicts in Nigeria, focusing on the conflicts purveyed by Boko Haram and Ansaru. My three-part articles on the emergence, trajectories and the way forward for the Boko Haram conflict which were excerpted from the research and published on Brookings’ blog (website), were exceedingly well received. In fact the first of the three instalments - ‘The Emergence of Boko Haram’ - holds the record of the highest read of all times on the AGI’s blog (website).

In September 2014 I was invited by Brookings’ AGI to do a brief technical report for its Africa Foresight publication on the 2015 presidential election in Nigeria. Since 2011 AGI has used its Africa Foresight publication to examine the trends, events, and other important factors that it believes will shape affairs in Sub-Saharan Africa throughout the year. For Nigeria, it felt the presidential election would be that decisive event.

The report was approved after several peer reviews on November 17 – before Buhari emerged as APC’s presidential candidate – and updated to take cognizance of this fact before it was published online on 29 January 2014 (the print version was published a few days later).

Essentially the piece was concluded before the re-invention of Buhari and the APC’s post-convention bounce which the party currently enjoys. The thrust of the report was not to predict who would win the 2015 presidential election but to analyse the dynamics that would shape the elections, the challenges that would likely be encountered and how these could be surmounted.


I have had to update the information in that report in recent interviews with the French news agency AFP and the American channels Bloomberg and CNBC Africa – among others. One of the issues that were not foreseen in the Africa Foresight report is the convergence of the normal post-convention bounce a party enjoys after its convention and the re-invention of Buhari – in the manner he speaks, his dress codes and even his general demeanour. These twin events are working to change the perceptions of Buhari among many Christians and people in the south as a northern irredentist or Muslim fanatic, making him look really electable.

[b]As of today, I believe that Buhari will do better in both the north and south than he did in 2011 while Jonathan will do worse in both the north and south than he did in 2011. The decisive issue however will be the level of Buhari’s over-performance and Jonathan’s underperformance. Here money, the way the PDP uses the power of incumbency and APC’s counter strategies, including its mobilisation and media strategies, will play key roles. My personal opinion is that in areas where the voters are sufficiently animated by a cause they believe in (such as among Buhari’s supporters in the Muslim north), the role of money or the power of incumbency in influencing the outcome, will be mute. However in areas where the elections are expected to be very tightly fought (such as in the battleground south west) or where the fear factor can be very easily played up (such as in the southeast, south- south and among Christians), the role of money (‘stomach infrastructure’), will be crucial. Here I believe the PDP enjoys a slight advantage and it is for this reason that I believe that if the elections were held today, the odds would still marginally favour the PDP despite the fact that the momentum is clearly with the APC.[/b]

By Dr Jideofor Adibe

Full report available below:

Source: http://saharareporters.com/2015/01/23/did-brookings-really-predict-jonathan-win-jideofor-adibe

Anybody can wake up tomorrow and play the slowpoke man from OTUOKE.YES!The highest chieftaincy title of his village CLUELESS 1 of OTUOKE has been reserved for him.Wish him journey mercy back to his village come MAY 29th,2015

interesting. i thot pdp said this people said gej will win?

I'm predicting that GEJ will win the presidential elections come 14 Feb 2015.

GEJ ALL THE WAY.YIPEE

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Nairaland why did this not make it to the front page ? I guess you have donated the front page to GEJ's campaign team we are waiting o #frontpagematerial

#febuhary2015