Adetutu Folasade-Koyi

As Nigerians file out to vote tomorrow, there is anxiety as to whether the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) or the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) can pull off a massive surprise, in the  presidential poll.

The National Assembly poll is also on the ballot, tomorrow, but it is the presidential election that has generated so much buzz; within and outside Nigeria.

For the record, there are 71 other presidential candidates in the race but, the contest is largely between the APC and the PDP.

PDP was in government for 16 years before the APC made history by defeating an incumbent government on March 28, 2015.

As the general election kicks off, tomorrow, Nigerians are, now, clearly divided betweeen supporting the incumbent and APC presidential candidate, President Muhammadu Buhari and former Vice President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, who is the PDP presidential candidate.

Meanwhile, the man Buhari defeated for the APC presidency, former President Goodluck Jonathan, has urged Nigerians to come out and vote en masse in tomorrow’s presidential election.

Jonathan, who asked citizens to shun violence and hate, said high turn out of voters is the best antidote to rigging.

He appealed to them to peacefully elect the country’s next president.

“My simple message to you is that if you love Nigeria, you must come out to vote.

“The best antidote to rigging of elections is a high voter turnout. Remember, none of us is greater than all of us,” he wrote on Facebook, yesterday.

The former president preached against voter apathy, and added that doing nothing is “the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil.

“As a wise man once said, ‘the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.’

“You are all good Nigerians. I, therefore, urge you to come out and vote based on your conscience and conviction.”

Jonathan, who was the first Nigerian president to be defeated in an election, said the quest for power is not worth the blood of any Nigerian.

He said: “Now, it is your turn to prove that nobody’s political ambition is worth the blood of any citizen.

“Shun violence, shun hatred. Come out this Saturday and vote peacefully for the Nigeria of your choice. Remember, we are all brothers and sisters born from the womb of one mother Nigeria.”

In Abuja, Also, Sultan of Sokoto and President of Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs, Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar, called on Nigerians to protect their votes in the presidential and National Assembly elections scheduled for tomorrow.

The Sultan said this, yesterday, during the 2019 Murtala Muhammed Memorial Lecture, organised by the Murtala Muhammed Foundation, with the theme: Towards credible, peaceful and participatory election–Moving Nigeria’s democracy forward.

“Why so much concern about the presidential election in Nigeria especially by foreign partners?

“We need to ask ourselves. But, the simple issue is that‎ Nigeria’s 200 million population is such a big concern to everybody.

“The reason is that the survivability of Nigeria is so important to the world that everybody must come together to see credible and peaceful elections in Nigeria where, whoever emerges will be accepted by all and must be accepted by all.”

Meanwhile, ECOWAS has deployed 200 election observers across the six geo-political zones of the country, ahead of tomorrow’s presidential and national assembly elections.

This was made known at a briefing by the ECOWAS Election Observation Mission to Nigeria, in Abuja, according to the News Agency of Nigeria.

The ECOWAS Commissioner for Political Affairs, Peace and Security, Francis Behanzin, noted that a pre-election fact-finding mission had been to Nigeria in November 2018 ahead of the elections.

Head of the mission, former Liberian President, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, tasked observers to be proactive in the discharge of their duties.