Flashback: I will campaign because this election is a do-or-die affair for PDP – Obasanjo in 2007

Ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo rigged April 2007 Presidential election for his party, the People’s Democratic Party.

The former president presided over an electoral process that was globally condemned as flawed. The Guardian UK described the election as a “fraud-tainted election” and the EU described it as “not credible.”

Washington called it “deeply troubling”.

The head of the EU’s observer mission, Max van den Berg, said in a statement that he could not endorse the vote as legitimate.

“These elections have not lived up to the hopes and expectations of the Nigerian people and the process cannot be considered to have been credible,” he said.

The US state department said the elections were flawed, “and in some cases deeply flawed.”

Prior to that election in 2007, while addressing elders and stakeholders of the PDP in Abeokuta, Ogun State capital, on 10 February 2007, Obasanjo sounded tough and categorical.

Like a warlord, he declared that the 2007 general elections would be a “do-or-die affair” for both himself and the ruling PDP.

“We want those who are going to succeed us to continue where we stopped,” he professed.

The President added that the electorate should be careful with their choice of leadership. According to him: “I read that somebody said I was campaigning. I will campaign because this election is a do-or-die affair for PDP. Why should we have criminals as leaders?” he queried.

His remark may have been the outpouring of a sincere heart, but it revealed the intentions of Obasanjo – PDP losing will never be accepted by him.

With the tough stand of Obasanjo, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, became a biased umpire in doing the bid of its master.

Expectedly, the election was a landslide victory for Obasanjo and the PDP. The PDP won the 2007 elections as Yar’Adua secured 70 percent of the total votes counted, and PDP candidates won 28 out of the 36 governorship races. The elections were seriously marred by ballot fraud and violence. Electoral observers, most notably the European Union Mission and the Transition Monitoring Group (which deployed 50,000 observers), were unanimous in underlining numerous irregularities in the voting process. Both stated that the elections were not credible and fell far short of basic international standards.

Obasanjo himself would later acknowledge electoral fraud. “Our elections could not have been said to have been perfect,” he said. “Cases of electoral fraud reported from parts of the country,” he said.

The head of the national election commission at the time, Maurice Iwu, said the ballot had “not gone without difficulties” and that it was “far from perfect” but blamed logistical difficulties.

He declared that overall the elections were “free and fair and credible”.

The Nigerian press strongly criticized the election calling it a “rape of democracy” and “fraudulent”.

That was the story of the 2007 election which brought the emergence of the late Umaru Yar’Adua.

But on Monday, February 27, 2023, Obasanjo, now wanting to play the role of a ‘statesman’ questioned the credibility of INEC even when the process was still ongoing. Political analysts have said Obasanjo’s statement was simply “pot calling kettle black.”

Prior to the 2007 general elections, electoral violence had been recorded in several parts of the federation. In Lagos, Engr, Funsho Williams, a PDP governorship aspirant was brutally murdered in his home at Dolphin Estate. The election proper was nothing to write home about as monumental violence was recorded.