By Ifeanyichukwu Afuba
Senator Victor Umeh second – guessed the bitterness that has caught up with campaigns for Anambra State, November 8, governorship election. Umeh had at the rebranding of Dr Paul Nwosu’s Anambra Times to Alpha Times on Thursday, June 19, 2025, pleaded with candidates and their supporters to keep the coming campaigns free of rancour. With gradual acceleration, the political bickerings recently turned into mudslinging, raising electoral temperature sharply.
Following a volley of accusations and counter accusations, the campaigns degenerated to personal attacks. As if that was not bad enough, candidates’ families have been roped into the fray. It’s a matter of concern that while Professor Charles Soludo’s broadsides with the APC’s Nicholas Ukachukwu/Uche Ekwunife raged, another front opened with the alleged beating of Patrick Mbah, Anambra State Commissioner of Youth Development by security men of YPP candidate, Paul Chukwuma.
Adversarial political competition is not new in Anambra State. The Second Republic years were marked by acute rivalry between the National Party of Nigeria and the Nigeria Peoples Party in the old Anambra State. Anchored around the gain of Alex Ekwueme’s vice presidency in a post war scenario, the NPN viewed NPP’s fiery rhetoric detrimental to the interest of the Igbo. The NPP which saw itself as a movement, however, considered NPN’s bar an inferior shot at the ultimate prize which Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe was over-qualified to assume. It was a contestation extensively and intensively prosecuted. The tension was easily felt because of the unique structure of the media at the time. All radio and television stations were government owned and private newspapers, few and far between. It was a period without the regulatory authority of today’s Nigeria Broadcasting Commission. Anambra Broadcasting Service and the local NTA Channel 8 station became theatres of the broadcast battles. On print media front, _Daily Star_ and _Weekly Trumpet_ amplified the divisions. Mid 1983, Abiola’s _National_ _Concord_ praised the restraint from violence in Anambra State in spite of the heated political exchanges. Two weeks later, the commendation was reduced to ashes with the Nwobodo – Ojukwu, Nkpor Junction faceoff.
It’s a given that the incumbent is on the receiving end at election campaigns. How else does the opposition command attention? The manifesto, a catalogue of what may be, is a tepid, if not boring tale. The bite, and therefore the news, is the declaration of the government as a failure. And the variety and punchier of illustrations of incompetence, the more headlines and followership attracted. And, there are citizens of Anambra State who, even without the detractions of the opposition, rate Soludo as underperforming. As elsewhere, civil society activism against government in Anambra State comprises both the cynical and the constructive. Some of Soludo’s predecessors were also victims of this belittling of whatever the efforts of government. In the case of those who opposed the government with what they considered superior argument, it sometimes boiled down to difference in perspectives. Other times, it was a matter of what ought to come first.
breach of any rule. What seems to have offended was the mockery without evidence of petition on authenticity of the certificates. The aggrieved parties saw the sarcasm over the certificates as unwarranted act of belittling. But as provocative as the certificate innuendos might be, the retaliation with stigmatisation of body make up was above bounds. And so much can also be said about morality of individual lifestyles. These are private matters that should not substitute public service debate. And what business has a Commissioner for Youth Development directing affairs at government hospital? Deliberately blocking the hospital gate with a vehicle was disorderly just as the physical assault by security operatives was misconduct. Desperation is the common element in this run of excesses.
In about eight weeks from now, the Anambra governorship election will be decided. Election outcome will most probably not be determined by intimidation and hot, empty rhetoric. Anambra’s civil society is enlightened and can claim a measure of political sophistication. She knows the indices for arriving at informed choices. As it were, the star card sometimes used to distort voter preference, is neutralised this time around. The Abuja reach balances out, setting the stage for a fair contest. An averagely performing incumbent is already a step ahead of his competitors. In Anambra State, the unwritten rule of zoning cannot be wished away. It predisposes the stand of the next benefitting zone in second term election. Five notable parties, namely APC, APGA, ADC, LP and YPP will slug it out in the November governorship election. Each of these parties promises to win some wards in the State. This dispersal setting is a perfect recipe for incumbent’s advantage.
Credit: The Sun