President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua again on Thursday admitted before the United Nations Secretary General, Mr. Ban-Ki Moon, that the process through which he became the president of Nigeria was faulty.


He said, “The April elections had flaws and shortcomings but it is significant that for the first time in our history, we had a civilian to civilian transfer of power

http://www.tribune.com.ng/saturday tribune 09.06.2007

I guess there is hope for Yar'Adua if he can be truthful with the people and seek remedies to the anomaly which is Nigerian entity and form of government.
He knows the process which ushered him in was a fraud  unprescedental in Nigeria's history.
The idiot Maurice Iwu and Obasanjo have continued to live in denial (parting their own backs and giving themselves pass marks) about the sham elections which sought to make Nigeria a one party State. Even the legislators themselves were not allowed to freely pick their own leaders. What can we ordinary people do. They have nothing realy to complain about as they are the beneficiaries of the sham (s)elections. But we as ordinary disenfranchised citizens are very much agrieved and we have a case to prosecute.
This just can't be swept under the carpets!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Bankole01:

He said, “The April elections had flaws and shortcomings but it is significant that for the first time in our history, we had a civilian to civilian transfer of power

Here is the problem, we are too comfortable accepting irregularities. to us, the end justifies the means!

Oga Yar Adua, it is NOT about mere civilian to civilian transfer of power BUT that the wish of the people is what prevails!!

davidylan:

Here is the problem, we are too comfortable accepting irregularities. to us, the end justifies the means!

Oga Yar Adua, it is NOT about mere civilian to civilian transfer of power BUT that the wish of the people is what prevails!!

This is the problem with our people. The thinking that it matters not how you get to a place, as long as you get there in the end is all that matters.
Here is a president of a large nation going to the G8 summit and telling them "I am illegitimate, but you have to forget how I got here and work with me"
How can somone like that be accorded any kind of respect??

But then on the other hand, where do we go from here? Even the US congress fears an ING has the potential of causing a military coup.
I believe the whole elections should be scrapped, form an interim govrnment and conduct new elections for all tiers of government.
The electoral body should be convened by the judiciary to implement impartiality.

Never at any time in my life have I felt so hopeless and cheated. The apathy in Nigeria has never been lower than at this time. This the legacy of Obasanjo who is now forming a paralell government to make sure his wishes still overshadows the puppet government of Yar'Adua.

What a huge shame. Yar Adua is aware he is working under a cloud of suspicion since the international community knows he is NOT the will of the people but that of an old chicken farmer.

For all his noise about those with grievances going to the courts of law, Yar Adua knows that our courts have been castrated by the immunity clause that protects fraudulent mandate thieves from being removed and prosecuted. Since the legislature is also guilty of rigging, he knows he dey kampe! He is merely trying to win over the international community by playing the contrite president with a listening ear. now we know better.

Bankole01 writes from USA, davidylan from NY comments. Bankole01 remarks again and davidylan comments.

azorjiu:

Bankole01 writes from USA, davidylan from NY comments. Bankole01 remarks again and davidylan comments.

so what are you? a referee? are you learning to type or just like to see your name in print?

Bankole01:

so what are you? a referee? are you learning to type or just like to see your name in print?

Shut up friend.

Eventhough, this statement by President Yaradua represents another OBJ's failure, but I'm disappointed that Yaradua had to make such a stupid statement. As a leader there are somethings you just don't touch. Just allow time to fix things naturally.
Absolutely no need to debase himself and Nigeria in front of the whole world.

degoat:

Eventhough, this statement by President Yaradua represents another OBJ's failure, but I'm disappointed that Yaradua had to make such a stupid statement. As a leader there are somethings you just don't touch. Just allow time to fix things naturally.
Absolutely no need to debase himself and Nigeria in front of the whole world.

Obviously . . .if he didn't say it,no one would have known how farcical our electoral process was

This is really funny, but the best man got selected maybe not elected

Let me tell you Bankole that even if the election was conducted free and fair Yar Adua would propably still win.

What OBJ did was a political masterstroke, look at the opposition they are propably not as good asYar Aua but they will have bought their way to Aso Rock,

IN any event each poltical party outrig each other in their own states.

AS for unfair and non free election remember George W. Bush and the hanging chard. He rigged his election during his first term.

However, now that Yar Adua was honest enough like OBJ did to accept that election was a joke. forming a goverment of national unity is more important now.

Thereafter. well qualified and officially paid oppostion is essential to check PDP goverment.

Electoral reforms and independence is a must.

JawJaw is better than warwar, we should move forward slowly surely we will get there by GOd's grace.

davidylan:

Here is the problem, we are too comfortable accepting irregularities. to us, the end justifies the means!

Oga Yar Adua, it is NOT about mere civilian to civilian transfer of power BUT that the wish of the people is what prevails!!

Since you are based in the US, can you state why the US accepted the fraud that brought in George Bush in 2006 or is it only when the issue concerns Nigeria that your wisdom comes into play?

Afam:

Since you are based in the US, can you state why the US accepted the fraud that brought in George Bush in 2006 or is it only when the issue concerns Nigeria that your wisdom comes into play?

In 2006,the Republicans lost Congress. . . so much for your "fraud" .Its an insult to our intelligence to seek to draw paralells between irregularities in US elections and what we have witnessed in Nigeria.You make a mockery of yourself.

@I-man/4Play,

My mistake, I meant 2000 afterall Bush did not stand for any election in 2006 so I wonder why the typo was not seen as one.

The year 2000. Now that the year has been corrected can you now comment on it or is it only to dwell on non issues that you enjoy doing?

Afam:

@I-man/4Play,
My mistake, I meant 2000 afterall Bush did not stand for any election in 2006 so I wonder why the typo was not seen as one.
The year 2000. Now that the year has been corrected can you now comment on it or is it only to dwell on non issues that you enjoy doing?

In 2000,the Republicans lost seats to the Democrats as well.Dwelling on non-issues?if someone is blithering . .I will tell him so.If you think that the elections conducted in Nigeria are just as good as the 2000 US elections,then your judgement is questionable.

What exactly is your point? Do you take time to understand posts before hitting the reply button??

Well Elections are either "Free and fair" or they are not.
Those who could not conduct free and fair elections for themselves should stop lecturing us on how to go about it. They lack the moral right to do that.

Afam:

What exactly is your point? Do you take time to understand posts before hitting the reply button??

Stop excusing the farcical elections conducted in Nigeria by drawing absurd parrallels with the US.

@I-man/4Play,

Stop beating around the bus, ok respond to the comments by oboatioko and Mckren for a change as they are even being mild in their posts which people like you that believe everything in Nigeria is bad don't deserve.

Afam:

@I-man/4Play,

Stop beating around the bus, ok respond to the comments by oboatioko and Mckren for a change as they are even being mild in their posts which people like you that believe everything in Nigeria is bad don't deserve.

You made an absurd point,I took you to task on it .That I believe that the recent elections were a farce does not mean I view "everything in Nigeria as bad".Spare me the drivel. We are discussing the recent elections and my view is that it was a charade.You, on the other hand are engaging in a bizarre attempt at denial by drawing utterly ludicrous parrallels.

Afam,
till when are you going to be like this? are we going to be learners of negatives only.
unfair elections in nigeria are been compared to that of america. why don't you compare the roads in nigeria and that of america? why don't you compare the security system in america and that of nigeria? why not compare the power supply to that america? why not compare the human rights in the two countries?
why not compare the standards of living in the two countries?
can you ever do without mentioning bush in any of your posts?
in your wiseness and wisdom, what are you in you councellorship ward, your local government, state and nigeria as a country talkless of west africa, africa and and the world? why and how do u in all ramifications put yourself above board.
the america u condem is by the special grace of God the best country in the world.
why don't you compare nigeria to such countries like ghana and togo instead of building csatles in the air.
a president in his wisdom went to a world meeting to tell the whole world that his position was not by the people's mind and we are to justify the move.
if that is a confession, then repentance must have forced that and if that is the case, he should have denounced his position and call for a fresh election.
we from time to time see criminals to police but they still face the law at the end of the day.
can someone tell me the difference between the justice melted on Ngige when it was confirmed that he was rigged into power in anambra? if he is telling us that he was rigged into power, then we wish to who by who and how and then confirm from the judiciary arm what the law of the land says about such acts and the actors.
it will be foolish for any people to work with a self confessed criminal who have come to preach justice.
such confession by means has created a hallow effect which will remain with the government for the next eight years.
he has gone a long way in telling the world how obasanjo the great have been fighting corruption since 1999.
he equally testified to his intention to stop the rulling elites - wow.
obasanjo mentioned it that old people will not rule nigeria again. meaning it has stopped with him and now yar adua ready to stop the ruling elites that is stopping with him. aren't nonsense. it must be from the babangidas. buharis, atikus, obasanjos or the likes- the born to rules and we will come back here to compare the decisssion with other countries yet we dye of hunger in a country blessed with all the natural resources of the earth.
for those who support these wicked acts, my prayers remains that same shall follow them like it is happening with our only Mustapha who is day dreaming in the same jail he used to visit like a king.

Again I will take as lightly diffrent approach and persectives on this issue.

Look election, is not free but it is popably fair even if you call it selection.

Yar Adua would still have won no matter what. We have an hopless oppostion and confused as well.  Among all of them is the most potent and the one that have diginity is yar adua and he and OBJ admit the flaws

People like Atiku and Bhuari will just think is the Nigeria thing or factor as they like to call it and will never admit flaws if they have been president.

What we need is how to move forward and run a better election next time,. If anybody want to challenge this, they can go tribunal or court.

By way of digression the North are hellbent on having the power back, they are not going to court as their man is there. Anyway from the little we know of Yar Adua, he is a decent man and well educated. He has also offer an olive branch to the oppostion to consider govt of national unity. He doesn't have to he got well over 70% of the vote, even if you discount some filled ballot boxes, he will still win.

As bad as PDP, the opposition does not have answer to persuade Nigerians. For example if they have gave a credible way they are going to fix electrictity they may have a chance but their candidate will still let them down.

The other question is whether he is strong enough or  a 'bully' enough to stand up to  Nigeria 'political class and thugs' only time will tell.

WE should be debating our future on how to make things better, cancelling, annulling election only has a reverse consequences of good. IBB and Abacha has proved the point before.

We hope that more decent candidate with clear vision will emerge in the future.

Election is not free but the result strangely is fair to well meaning Nigerians.Do you think Nigerian's will willingly elect Bhuari or Atiku, they will have to have rig massively themselves or buy their way into Aso Rock.

God continue to bless Nigeria

There was electoral Fraud in the elections in Ohio for George Bush 2nd term too.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/KEE411A.html

http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_5374.cfm


How Bush Stole the 2004 Election: GOP's Cyber Election Hit Squad Exposed
GOP's Cyber Election Hit Squad Exposed
By Steven Rosenfeld and Bob Fitrakis
TomPaine.com, April 24, 2007
Straight to the Source


Did the most powerful Republicans in America have the computer capacity, software skills and electronic infrastructure in place on election night 2004 to tamper with the Ohio results to ensure George W. Bush's re-election?

The answer appears to be yes. There is more than ample documentation to show that on Election Night 2004 , Ohio's "official" Secretary of State website - which gave the world the presidential election results - was redirected from an Ohio government server to a group of servers that contain scores of Republican web sites, including the secret White House e-mail accounts that have emerged in the scandal surrounding Attorney General Alberto Gonzales's firing of eight federal prosecutors.

Recent revelations have documented that the Republican National Committee (RNC) ran a secret White House e- mail system for Karl Rove and dozens of White House staffers. This high-tech system used to count and report the 2004 presidential vote - from server-hosting contracts, to software-writing services, to remote- access capability, to the actual server usage logs themselves - must be added to the growing congressional investigations.

Numerous tech-savvy bloggers, starting with the online investigative consortium epluribusmedia.org and their November 2006 article cross-posted by contributor luaptifer to Dailykos , and Joseph Cannon's blog at Cannonfire..com, outed the RNC tech network. That web-hosting firm is SMARTech Corp. of Chattanooga, TN, operating out of the basement in the old Pioneer Bank building. The firm hosts scores of Republican websites, including georgewbush.com, gop.com and rnc.org.

The software created for the Ohio secretary of state's Election Night 2004 website was created by GovTech Solutions, a firm co-founded by longtime GOP computing guru Mike Connell. He also redesigned the Bush campaign's website in 2000 and told Inside Business magazine in 1999, "I wouldn't be where I am today without the Bush campaign and the Bush family because the Bushes truly are about family and I'm loyal to my network."

Ohio's Cedarville University, a Christian school with 3,100 students, issued a press release on January 13, 2005 describing how faculty member Dr. Alan Dillman's computing company Government Consulting Resources, Ltd, worked with these Republican-connected companies to tally the vote on Election Night 2004.

"Dillman personally led the effort from the GCR side, teaming with key members of Blackwell's staff," the release said. "GCR teamed with several other firms - including key players such as GovTech Solutions, which performed the software development - to deliver the end result. SMARTech provided the backup and additional system capacity, and Mercury Interactive performed the stress testing."

On Election Night 2004, the Republican Party not only controlled the vote-counting process in Ohio, the final presidential swing state, through a secretary of state who was a co-chair of the Bush campaign, but it also controlled the technology that allowed the tally of the vote in Ohio's 88 counties to be reported to the media and voters.

Privatizing elections and allowing known partisans to run a key presidential vote count is troubling enough. But the reason Congress must investigate these high- tech ties is there is abundant evidence that Republicans could have used this computing network to delay announcing the winner of Ohio's 2004 election while tinkering with the results.

Did Ohio Republican Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell or other GOP operatives inflate the president's vote totals to secure George W. Bush's margin of victory? On Election Night 2004, many of the totals reported by the secretary of state were based on local precinct results that were impossible. In Clyde, Ohio, a Republican haven, Bush won big after 131 percent voter turnout. In Republican Perry County, two precincts came in at 124 percent and 120 percent respectively. In Gahanna Ward 1, precinct B, Bush received 4,258 votes despite the fact that only 638 people voted for president. In Concord Southwest in Miami County, the certified election results proudly proclaimed at 679 out of 689 registered voters cast ballots, a 98.55 percent turnout. FreePress.org later found that only 547 voters had signed in.

These strange election results were routed by county election officials through Ohio's Secretary of State's office, through partisan IT providers and software, and the final results were hosted out of a computer based in Tennessee announcing the winner. The Cedarville University releases boasted the system "was running like a champ." It said, "The system kept running through the early morning hours as users from around the world looked to Ohio for their election results."

All the facts are not in, but enough is known to warrant a serious congressional inquiry. Beginning with a timeline on election night after a national media consortium exit poll predicted Democrat John Kerry would win Ohio, the first Ohio returns were from the state's Democratic urban strongholds, showing Kerry in the lead.

This was the case until shortly after midnight on Wednesday, Nov. 5, when for roughly 90 minutes, the Ohio election results reported on the secretary of state's website were frozen. Shortly before 2 a.m. EST election returns came in from a handful of the state's rural Republican enclaves, bumping Bush's numbers over the top.

It was known Bush would carry rural Ohio. But the vote totals from these last-to-report counties, where Karl Rove said there was an unprecedented late-hour evangelical vote giving the White House a moral mandate, were highly improbable, and suggested vote count fraud to pad Bush's numbers. Just how flimsy the reported GOP totals were was not known on election night and has not been examined by the national media. But an investigation by the House Judiciary Committee Democratic staff begun after Election Day 2004 and completed before the Electoral College met on Jan. 6, 2005, was first to publicly point to vote count fraud in rural Ohio.

That report, "Preserving Democracy: What Went Wrong in Ohio," cited near-impossible vote totals, including 19,000 votes that were mysteriously added at the close of tallying the vote in Miami County. The report cited more than 3,000 apparently fraudulent voter registrations - all dating back to the same day in 1977 in Perry County. The report noted a homeland security emergency was declared in Warren County, prompting its ballots to be taken to a police-guarded unauthorized warehouse and counted away from public scrutiny, despite local media protests.

In our book, What Happened in Ohio: A Documentary Record of Theft and Fraud in the 2004 Election (The New Press, 2006), we go beyond the House Judiciary Democratic report to analyze precinct-by-precinct returns and we print copies of the documents upon which we base our findings. We found many vote-count irregularities based on examining the certified results, precinct-level records and the actual ballots.

The most eyebrow-raising example to emerge from parsing precinct results was finding 10,500 people in three Ohio "Bible Belt" counties who voted to re-elect Bush and voted in favor of gay marriage, if the official results are true. That was in Warren, Butler and Clermont Counties. The most plausible explanation for this anomaly, which defies logic and was not seen anywhere else in the country, was Kerry votes were flipped to Bush while the rest of the ballot was left alone. While we have some theories about how that might have been done by hand in a police-guarded warehouse, could full Republican control of the vote-counting software and servers also have played a role?

The early returns on the secretary of state's website suggest Blackwell's vote-tallying and reporting system could manipulate large blocks of votes. Screenshots taken during the early returns in Hamilton County, where Cincinnati is located, gave Green Party presidential candidate David Cobb 39,541 votes, which was clearly incorrect. Similarly, early return screenshots in Lucas County, where Toledo is located, gave Cobb 4,685 votes, another clear error. (The screenshots are in our book). Were these innocent computer glitches or was a GOP vote-counting and reporting system moving and dumping Kerry votes?

There's more evidence the late returns from Ohio's Republican-majority countryside were not accurate. During the spring and summer of 2006, several teams of investigators associated with Freepress.org, notably one team led by Ron Baiman, a Ph.D. statistician and researcher at Chicago's Loyola University, examined the actual election records from precincts in Miami and Clermont Counties. These records - from poll books where voters sign in, to examining the actual ballots themselves - were not publicly accessible until last year, under orders from Ohio's former Republican secretary of state. Baiman compared the number of voters who signed in with the total number of votes attributed to precincts. He found hundreds of "phantom" votes, where the number of voter signatures was less than the reported vote total. That discrepancy also suggests vote count fraud.

There was other evidence in the observable paper trail of padding the vote, including instances in Delaware County where in one precinct, 359 of the final punch- card ballots cast on election day contained no Kerry votes, which means the day's last voters all were Bush supporters, which also is improbable. In another Delaware County precinct, Bush allegedly received the last 210 votes of the day. Were partisan local election workers trying to mask what was happening electronically to tilt the vote count?

Ohio's 2004 ballots were to be destroyed last September. However that fate was blocked by a federal judge, who ruled in the early phase of trying a Voting Rights Act lawsuit that accused Ohio officials of suppressing the minority vote in Ohio's cities. The state's new secretary of state and attorney general, both Democrats, are now holding settlement talks for that suit, suggesting its claims have merit. However, unlike Florida after the 2000 election, there still has yet to be a full accounting of Ohio's presidential vote.

What's clear, however, is the highest ranks of the Republican Party's political wing, including White House counselor Karl Rove, a handful of the party's most tech-savvy computer gurus and the former Republican Ohio secretary of state, created, owned and operated the vote-counting system that reported George W. Bush's re-election to the presidency. Moreover, it appears the votes that gave Bush his 118,775-vote margin of victory - the boost from Ohio's countryside - have yet to be confirmed as accurate. Instead, the reporting to date suggests that what happened on the ground and across Ohio's rural precincts is at odds with the vote tally released on election night.

As numerous congressional committees attempt to retrieve and examine the secret White House e-mails surrounding Attorney General Alberto Gonzales' firing of eight federal prosecutors, those panels must also probe the privatization and partisan manipulation of the 2004 presidential vote count in Ohio. The lessons from 2004 have yet to be fully understood or learned.

Similarly, the House Administration Committee, which is expected to soon mark up H.R. 811, a bill by Rep. Rush Holt, D-NJ, to regulate electronic voting technology, also must take heed. The vote count and outcome of American elections cannot be left in the hands of known partisans, who can control and manipulate how the votes are counted and what is reported to the media and American people.

Public vote counts on private, partisan servers and secret proprietary software have no place in a democracy.

Whew! What was all that for? So after posting that epistle should we then agree that the nig. rigging was justified.

If this country would go anywhere from dump we gotto tell our leaders the cold truth: stop taking us for a ride. We keep getting worse @ the act of electoral fraud: 99 was bad, 2003 was terrible, 2007 was 'did u see that'? And to justify this perfidy one bozo posts some epistle about the isolated case in the US' competitive democracy that saw the dems win congress majority under a rep president.

chidichris:

Afam,

Can someone tell this man to stop addressing Afam with his incoherent statements?

This forum is not a substitute for real education and this man should know so.

initiator:

Whew! What was all that for? So after posting that epistle should we then agree that the Nigeria. rigging was justified.

If this country would go anywhere from dump we gotto tell our leaders the cold truth: stop taking us for a ride. We keep getting worse @ the act of electoral fraud: 99 was bad, 2003 was terrible, 2007 was 'did u see that'? And to justify this perfidy one bozo posts some epistle about the isolated case in the US' competitive democracy that saw the dems win congress majority under a rep president.

Tell them abeg! The only way we can justify Yar Adua's blatant rigging into office and compare it to that of George Bush is if the opposition party won majority of legislative seats!

So because Bush "rigged" his way to power it is justified that we siddon kampe while our leaders cheat us out of our mandates? What of corruption? Did we copy that from Bush too?

What ever you epistle you post about the election that brought bush in it is not needed here. the truth still remains that a president should never make such statement it is absolutely wrong.

If he believes that the process that brought him into power was a sham why didn't he just resign his seat and call for a fresh election.Although to me even if i am not one of his fans i know he would have won the election on a free and fair ground.

initiator:

Whew! What was all that for? So after posting that epistle should we then agree that the Nigeria. rigging was justified.

If this country would go anywhere from dump we gotto tell our leaders the cold truth: stop taking us for a ride. We keep getting worse @ the act of electoral fraud: 99 was bad, 2003 was terrible, 2007 was 'did u see that'? And to justify this perfidy one bozo posts some epistle about the isolated case in the US' competitive democracy that saw the dems win congress majority under a rep president.

It takes a bigger bozo to know a bozo.

Meanwhile it will do you good to understand posts before commenting on them.

If you understood my post then you would not have come to the conclusion you reach because my post was to point out that while the Nigerian living in the US believes that it is only in Nigeria that electoral fraud will happen and a war will not break out I pointed out a fact that US saw 2 rigged elections under 5 years and nothing happened.

If this is too much to understand then go to the Jokes section

Yaradua is a sharia apologist and a 419 president.


He would be hunted for rest of his life by accepting the fraudulent presidency!!

babasin:

Yaradua , ,  He would be hunted for rest of his life by accepting the fraudulent presidency!

Who should have won the Elections?

Everyone should cool down. I believe the essence of this thread is to have meaningful debates over our just concluded selection. Before I comment further, let me make a very very strong point about appreciating the full nature of issues from outside. I believe MKO used to say that if you want to drive a car you got to sit in front not in the back. The view from inside Nigeria is a far cry from what we see out here.

I was previllaged to be in Nigeria during the last elections and quite frankly it was a real real shame that after over 40yrs of independence, we still can not organise ourselves properly to do anything meaningful. I know we all go on about Yar adua being a graduate, but I wonder whats sort or gradate would allow a chicken farmer manipulate him the way Obj did. The truth is that, if he really did admit that his selection was flawed, his office can never really have the legitimacy or authority it deserve. That is the Plain fact. However, I still think that it would be very wrong at this stage for anyone to compare what happened in Nigeria with the Elections held in the West, two different continents, totally different situations and factors, if you where in Nigeria during the elction, it was almost like we were at war, that millitary heavyly armed everywhere.

To be honest I am not quite sure what that best way forward for us now would be. Maybe for Yar adua to call for fresh elections, but not quite sure he has that sort of power

Afam:


If you understood my post then you would not have come to the conclusion you reach because my post was to point out that while the Nigerian living in the US believes that it is only in Nigeria that electoral fraud will happen and a war will not break out I pointed out a fact that US saw 2 rigged elections under 5 years and nothing happened.

If this is too much to understand then go to the Jokes section

Fact of 2 rigged elections under 5 years ? Your penchant for bending the truth is  unprecedented. Since these 2 elections were obviously "rigged",what has the Democratic majority done about this?

Its interesting that you are unequivocal in branding US elections as "rigged" while showing a shameful reluctance to state same for the Nigerian elections.Your moral myopia is pathetic.