2015 Election Projections




Projections:

If the rule that incumbents win 85% of the time with a 60% share of votes holds, for the 10 states with incumbents running for re-election in the governorship elections, a likely outcome is that the APC wins 6 seats while the PDP wins 4.
There are 18 vacant seats which will have no incumbent contesting. In 2011, the PDP won 60% of such seats while opposition parties (although before uniting as the APC) collectively won 40%. Working with this admittedly crude assumption (based on just five vacant seats contested in 2011), the PDP is therefore likely to win 10 governorship states while the APC gets 8 states.
Therefore in states holding elections in 2015, it is likely that the PDP ends up with 14 states and the APC with 14. If these figures are added to the other states without governorship elections, the tally is:
PDP: 14 states + 3 non-participating states = 17
APC: 14 states + 3 non-participating states = 17
APGA = 1 non-participating state
Labour = 1 non-participating state
Total 36 states

This could mean that PDP and allied parties will control 19 states, fewer than the 22 it currently does. However, these are broad generalisations and it is difficult to identify the specific states in question.

Nigeria Elections Presidential election projections

Going by the initial rule we applied, if the PDP candidate is incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan, he might seem to have an 85% chance of winning with about 60% of the votes. However, given Nigeria’s Federal system, the proportion of vacant governorship seats and the rapidly changing alliances in the political landscape, other variables may come into play.
We can assume that states largely support the same party for Presidential elections as they do for Governorship elections (although in 2011 a number of mainly northern states, as well as ACN states in in an electoral pact with PDP in the South-West, bucked the trend).
Going by the 85% assumption, if local incumbency is the prime factor, since 22 of the states are currently PDP or allied parties in the current dispensation, the PDP may win the Presidential vote in 21 states (19 PDP states and 2 APC states), and the APC meanwhile would win Presidential votes in 15 states (12 currently APC and 3 PDP states). This is likely to be enough for a simple majority.[1]
If however, we go by the projected trends in the governorship elections as useful pointers, we end up with a different result, with both parties winning in 17 states each.

The absolute numbers of voters cannot be predicted but it may be significant that the APC goes into the election controlling two states with the largest number of registered voters, Lagos (6.1 million registered voters in 2011) and Kano (5 million).
Also remember that section 134 (1) of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution lays down two conditions for a victory; one is a majority of votes cast, but the other is a minimum of 25% of registered voters in two-thirds of Nigeria’s states (i.e. 24 states).
Currently, with support of Labour and APGA, the PDP controls enough states to ensure that. However, in 2011 Bauchi state did not reach the needed minimum even when controlled by PDP, delivering only 16.05% of the vote for the party’s candidate, while Katsina, also PDP, only just scraped over the minimum with 26.1%. So it is reasonable to assume that if support or turnout is low in PDP-ruled northern states, not all may deliver the 25% minimum needed to secure a win for the party’s candidate.
In such a circumstance, the Constitution states that candidates would be forced into a second-round run-off election. Such a situation has not previously occurred under Nigeria’s present electoral system.

Therefore, of three possible outcomes – outright PDP win, outright APC win, or a run-off election – the most likely outcome based on our projections from current data is that neither party would manage both factors for an outright victory so there would need to be an additional run-off election.

Neither is it clear which party that situation would favour. On one hand a nationally incumbent party may retain more resources to continue mobilising, but on the other, both the voting public and important political intermediaries may perceive momentum in the opposition which galvanises support for them popularity.
If the presidential election does not favour an outright win for the PDP, it may also further weaken the PDP’s chances at the subsequent gubernatorial level given the proportion of vacant seats (18) to incumbent re-elections (10). The deciding states for the presidential election and the overall fortune of the two parties will be those 18 vacant seats, which also happen to have 54.4% (40.03 million) of 2011’s registered voters, including 10 of the 14 states with the largest number of registered voters, underlining just how open this race really is.

Some Caveats

Incumbency advantages are very dependent on specific local factors, such as candidates, coalitions, party machinery, electorate sophistication, local issues and more; therefore it is hard to make a solid prediction on the outcomes. Importantly, the 2015 elections appear as if they will be a two-party race in all states, although this may also change if heavyweights who lose primaries in the two major parties decide to leave them.
In such a situation, the advantages of incumbency calculated from the 2011 multi-party elections may have less predictive value at the gubernatorial elections because the APC is a merger of three parties with varying strengths; the ACN, CPC and ANPP. This is additionally complex in states (such as Kano, Imo and Kwara) where PDP governors crossed over to the APC.

In that case, the advantage of incumbency would go beyond 11% because we would need to consider what proportion of the 2011 vote for other parties in the merger (i.e. CPC and ANPP) will be scooped up by APC. Additionally, in most of the states where the governor crossed over from the national ruling PDP with some or all of his supporters, the PDP still has a solid state structure.
While we are able to make some plausible projections where incumbents are re-contesting in 2015, it is difficult to do so for the 18 vacant seats because the parameters so far cannot test the strength of the opposition merger. What we can say however is that these seats will be hotly-contested.

Since presidential elections occur before governorship elections, it is possible these projections may have little predictive value on the outcome of the presidential elections because the patterns of voting for the governorship and presidential elections are considerably different.[2]
Moreover, there is no clear pattern – beyond an assumed incumbency advantage – by which states vote for a presidential candidate. Several factors come into play such as the interaction of local and national coalitions, incumbency, popularity of presidential candidates, local actors – governorship candidates and power brokers, relative party strength and structure, type of identity allegiances, and historical political behaviour of states.


Zainab Usman is a DPhil Candidate at the University of Oxford. Oliver Owen is Junior Research Fellow in International Development at the Oxford Department of International Development.

Guess work giving the ja.nja.wee.d hope so as to rig the election or cry foul when defeated

Like say analysis no de different from real time experience.

What a map, I doubt if PDP will win in Bauchi, except if the Governor will defect like Yuguda do...

Wrong projections, in Edo Gej will garner more than 79% vote. In presidential elections Edo state vote for the contestant(person) and not the party.

Lol story...

Usbeel:
What a map, I doubt if PDP will win in Bauchi, except if the Governor will defect like Yuguda do...

The map represents states currently controlled by the parties.

Aaaaabbbbbeeeegggggyyyy

And PDP wins Katsina state. Smh.

This country is headed for a revolution.

2cato:
Guess work giving the ja.nja.wee.d hope so as to rig the election or cry foul when defeated

let them get ready to overflood river ethiope with their tears.

Very shallow and not even lucid. People from Oxford actually did this?

pls give us a link to this projections cum speculations.

we are tied of taking your words for it, recently we were well educated by datolee never to make such mistakes again.

provide us links to the institutions web portal were you got this publications or i will have the mods take down this thread.

With d look of things, APC have no place in that Aso-rock, GEJ must win...
Believe it or not.
MOG has spoken!