Yar'Adua may lose job

2007-11-21 13:15

Abuja - Umaru Yar'Adua looks serene in the official portrait hanging in a courtroom, where lawyers in black robes are trying to unseat him as president of Nigeria.

But his position might be less secure than the photograph, nailed to the wall next to the national coat of arms.

The presidential tribunal was a special electoral court empowered to hear petitions against Yar'Adua's victory in April by losing candidates. He said that he would respect its decision.

For the past six weeks, state election tribunals had dislodged four governors, all from the ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP), over irregularities in the elections that gave them and Yar'Adua their mandates.

This had triggered rumours that the presidential tribunal could do the same. Political columnists were speculating about what would happen and investors were worried.

'Yar'Adua will probably win again'

Sebastian Spio-Garbrah, an analyst at Eurasia Group, said: "The spectre of a court-ordered presidential poll re-run hangs over Nigeria."

Should the presidential tribunal overturn the result, the best scenario would be a peaceful re-run, said analysts. Yar'Adua would probably win again and, if the election were cleaner, he would have a stronger mandate to carry out reforms.

But Nigeria, a chaotic country of 140 million people with a history of botched elections and military coups, could also fall into prolonged limbo with legal battles over how the re-run should be conducted and by whom.

Bismarck Rewane, head of Financial Derivatives company in Lagos, said: "This adds political risk to the Nigeria picture and investors are factoring that in."

The results of the April elections for president, governors and legislators were contested from the minute they were announced. Opponents and neutral observers reported vote-rigging and intimidation on a huge scale.

5 governors 'lost their seats'

Yar'Adua acknowledged there were flaws, promised to reform the electoral system and, crucially, declared that any complaints should be properly addressed by free and fair election tribunals.

Perhaps emboldened by these assurances, the tribunals set to work on hundreds of petitions by losing candidates, from the state house of assembly level to the presidency.

After months of technical arguments, preliminary objections and formalities, rulings started trickling in from the states. Some legislative results had been overturned, but the real headline-grabbers had been the gubernatorial upsets.

Five PDP governors had now lost their seats - one because of a Supreme Court ruling in June and four others in election tribunal rulings delivered since October 10 - and several more looked likely to suffer the same fate.

In the federal capital, Abuja, everyone was talking about what would happen if Yar'Adua's victory were overturned. Would he appeal? Would he run again or step down? Who would run on the PDP ticket if not him?

- Reuters