Governor of Kaduna state, Nasir El-Rufai, on Monday asserted that President Muhammadu Buhari has never used the sheer power of the federal government to manipulate electoral process.
The Editor Nigeria reports that El-Rufai made the assertion on while reacting to the outcome of Edo state governorship election which was held on Saturday.
Godwin Obaseki, candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), polled 307,955 to defeat Osagie Ize-Iyamu, candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), who secured 223,619 votes.
Speaking when he featured on Sunrise Daily, a programme on Channels Television, el-Rufai said Buhari did not allow the will of the people to be subverted.
He, however, disclosed that he was optimistic that the APC would win the election, noting that developments pointed out that the ruling party would emerge victorious at the poll but things changed three weeks to the poll.
He said the president didn’t use federal power that previous administration used to disrupt democratic process and steal elections.
“We’d have loved to win. Quite frankly, I was optimistic up to three weeks ago because there was indication that we were going to win. I don’t know what happened in the last two, three weeks of the campaign. As you know, a large number of voters make up their minds in the last two weeks of election, many voters decide no matter what happens, this is how I’m voting, †el-Rufai said.
“Three weeks ago, the polls clearly showed that APC is going to win but the results came out differently from what we expected. There was very little violence or none at all. So, Obaseki has won, that’s it.
“One thing that President Muhammadu Buhari’s government has always done is to say that there must be free and fair elections and the people’s choice must prevail. The president has never used what is called federal might that other governments have used in the past to steal elections. We always insist that everyone should go and pitch to the people and may the best man win and we can live with it.â€
