Niger Delta Weekly Buzz for 30 Jan - 19 Feb, Part 1: A Historic Registration, and the Security Factor

News and Resources from the Niger Delta Working Group

Weekly Buzz

30 January – 19 February 2011

Deirdre LaPin

Part 1

Voter registration ends February 5 and a two-day extension is granted for some states

Nigeria’s most ambitious voter registration exercise in history ended for most of the nation on February 5.  To overcome many of the logistical and technical glitches that dogged its first week (See Weeky Buzz 9 - 29 January), the original deadline of January 29 was extended to include a third week to ensure maximum coverage. A few localities scattered across the nation were granted two additional days for a “mop-up” exercise because logistical or administrative errors had unfairly cut time short for some would-be voters.  In the Niger Delta, they included Warri North, Warri South and Warri South-West local government areas, where registration began late.  (These LGAs were famed for violent electoral disputes during the 1997-2005 “Warri Wars.”) Uyo in  Akwa Ibom State was also given the two-day extension.

By February 10 the head of the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC head Attahiru Jega announced that a provisional total of 63,981,460 voters had been registered, representing about 85 percent of returns received. On February 15, he reported that 65.2 million voters had been registered and estimated that the full total was likely to reach 66 million when all registrations were counted. While the figure falls short of the demographic maximum of 70 million, it very closely approximates INEC’s initial estimate of 65,783,046 registrants.  [By February 21, INEC reported that it had registered a total of 67,764,327 million Nigerians … 2 million in excess of their initial estimate.]

There were hitches, certainly.  Most related to the computerized Direct Data Capture technology and was partially overcome with a patch that reduced the sensitivity of the fingerprint scanning program. With this improvement, the time cost of registration diminished in the second week. Isolated issues such as the “biased” location of polling stations, evidence of multiple registrations, and the reported purchase of voter’s cards by political interests were noted.  (Here, the Aides and even the wife of a Niger Delta governor were singled out by the press.) There was also an attempt to register primary school students in Enugu!   Security personnel were not evenly distributed and most personnel were learning their election duties on the job. Polling stations opened late, ran out of ink and paper for printers, plastic for cards, and the electric generators supplied were often as “epileptic” as PHCN. Still, INEC and the Nigerian voters showed determination, perseverance, ingenuity, and team spirit in their sincere efforts to make the voter registration a success. 

Project 2011 Swift Count, an initiative of several Nigerian NGOs (FOMWAN, JDPC, NBA, and TMG) has released a series of registration reports. A senior project member observed, “Overall, as of Saturday January 29, the originally scheduled end for the exercise, we are encouraged by the registration process.  As is widely known, the voter registration exercise started extremely poorly, but has significantly improved. It has not been perfect, but INEC has recognized problems and has addressed them promptly.” The project partners fielded approximately 1,000 observers who were deployed to collect comprehensive information in every one of Nigeria’s 774 Local Government Areas (LGAs) on three specified days during the voter registration period.  They reported “dramatic improvement over time,” especially in prompt opening at polling stations and the functioning of the direct data capture (DDC) systems.

A verification of all returns was scheduled for February 14 to 18 and required voters to return to polling sites to vet rolls that were to be prominently posted.  It is likely that many prospective voters calculated that a second effort -- to check that their names had been recorded in the system -- carried a lower potential benefit than the registration itself.  As such, it was a somewhat desultory affair. At many polling stations all across the country people were not bothering to show up.  Some who arrived were disappointed not to find lists posted or their names on lists that were displayed.  An added deterrent for hopeful voters was the sheer bureaucracy of resolving wrong names, omissions, and duplications. Submitting a written form and negotiating a correction was not always certain to bring desired results.  In many stations INEC staff were absent for hours or days at a time. No voter lists were seen in the whole of Cross River State for two days.  In Lagos, according to one journalist, about half of polling stations did not open or did not display voter lists.

Weak participation in the verification exercise is not a show stopper, but it weakens the credibility of the election results. INEC’s concern above all was to eliminate double registration… and for the most part, purging duplicate registrants was done electronically and did not require verification by voters. For example, the Imo State Resident Electoral Commissioner observed that about 11,000 out of 1,683,237 million people in the state had registered more than once.  As hoped, these attempts were detected by the Direct Data Capture machines, and the duplicates were isolated. 

A final posting of registered voter names is scheduled for March 2. 

Registration is now closed for the April elections, but future voters will have another bite at the cherry after April, when INEC will initiate “continuous registration” as mandated by law.

Are there missing registered voters in the Niger Delta?

In the last Weekly Buzz we noted with concern that logistical constraints in the Niger Delta, especially in coastal areas, created a very slow start.  At that time, INEC’s interim results after 8-9 days of registration showed the coastal Niger Delta states lagging behind others, typically with only about one-quarter of expected voters registered. The latest registration results [with a bit more than 85% of returns available] show gross returns by geo-political zone as follows:

Gross Est. Registration Numbers by Zone (85% returns)

North-West Nigeria 18 Million

South-West Nigeria 15 Million

North-East Nigeria 8 Million

North-Central 8 Million

South-South Nigeria 8 Million

South-East Nigeria 7 Million

Total 64 million

 [south = 30m, north =34m or 53%]

Actual registrants vs. expected: 

By 6 February (the last date of registration) the Guardian newspaper reported that over 2.2 million voters had registered in Rivers State (as against 2.5m expected – by February 21 the reported total was 2.4m) and 1.2 million in Cross Rivers (as against 1.13m expected). In aggregate, however, it seems that even when 100% of returns are eventually counted, registration in the Niger Delta will likely fall short of the expected numbers. The nine Niger Delta states are comprised of the six South-South states, plus Imo and Abia from the South-East and Ondo from the South-West.  The following table shows INEC’s 22-day projection for expected results in the nine states.  I have also added up the aggregates for the South-East, the South-South, and the Niger Delta as a whole. These are highlighted in yellow.

Actual results for the southern zones are lower than the projected estimates shown in the table.  The 8.9 million actually registered in the South-South is short by around 1.3 million of the expected total of 10.2 million.  Baylesa State showed a surprising shortfall of nearly 50%.  Repeated political strife and violence in that state may have dampened voter enthusiasm.  Imo and Abia were estimated to yield over 5 million registrants, but the results show that the entire SE zone (5 states in all) appears to have registered over 7 million.   Similar anomalies do not show for other geo-political zones.  Were the projections in error?   Did a large number of voters simply miss out on the registration?  Did they migrate out of their zones – a likely outcome in the insecure SE? Are the  missing registrants a symptom of apathy? …very difficult terrain and communications …INEC inefficiency? 

We will know more when the final voter rolls are verified.

INFORMATION ON INEC REGISTRATION and PROJECTIONS AS ON January 26, 2011

And Final Totals February 21, 2011

(Adapted from The Nation, January 27, 2011 and inecnigeria.org)

State  A	First Day B	Days Recorded so Far C	Total Registered So Far D	Daily Average E	15 Day Projection F	22 Day Projection G	2006 Census H	Provi- sional  Totals 21 Feb
•Abia (SE)	3,586	8	928,323	116,040	1,740,606	2,552,888	2,845,380	1,481,191
•Akwa Ibom  (SE)	6,076	4	210,627	52,657	789,851	1,158,449	3,902,051	1,714,781
•Bayelsa  (SS)	758	10	407,122	40,712	610,683	895,668	1,704,515	472,389
•Cross River  (SS)	N/A	9	465,493	51,721	775,822	1,137,872	2,892,988	1,018660
•Delta  (SS)	N/A	5	670,945	134,189	2,012,835	2,952,158	4,112,445	1,900.055
•Edo (SS)	7,268	6	420,324	70,054	1,050,810	1,541,188	3,233,366	1,412,225
•Imo  (SE)	0	7	806,796	115,257	1,728,849	2,535,645	3,927,563	1,611, 715
•Ondo  (SW)	16,961	5	482,748	96,550	1,448,244	2,124,091	3,460,877	1,558,975
•Rivers  (SS)	23,014	7	799,724	114,246	1,713,694	2,513,418	5,198,716	2,419,057
South-South TOTALS						10,198,753		8,937167
+ 3 states						+7,212,624		4,651881
Niger Delta  TOTALS						17,411,377		13,589,048
NATIONAL TOTALS			22,175,623		44,852,076	65,783,046	140,431,790	67,764,327
Niger Delta % of national total as projected						26.5%		20%

Security as the key critical success factor for credible elections

The INEC Chairman Jega noted that security is the greatest challenge facing the commission.  “We are already seeing the ugly head of electoral violence across the country, not only in areas that are experiencing communal and political violence unrelated to the elections like the Jos Plateau, Niger Delta and Borno States, but in other relatively quiet parts of the country. Indeed, it is clear that pre-existing conflict processes are inevitably exacerbated during elections, where security is weak and where political actors do not exercise restraint.”  A detailed and coordinated security plan for the elections has been developed with the security services, including the SSS.

I. - THE NORTH

North-East. The mix of motives that underlie electoral violence were perhaps most openly displayed in the shocking assassination on 28 January of  Alhaji Modu Fannami Gubio, the  Borno State Commissioner for Finance and Economic Development and ANPP governorship  candidate.   The murderous assault was claimed by the Islamist group Boko Haram.  It also took the lives of Alhaji Goni Sheriff -- younger brother of  Governor Ali Modu Sheriff -- two security details attached to Gubio, and  three  other persons.  In part, the aim was political.  The sect, which seeks to replace Nigeria’s secular administration with an Islamic political order, viewed the favored ANPP candidate as a future adversary. Revenge was a second motive.  Boko Haram holds Governor Sheriff (and by extension his family) responsible for the death of its leader Mohammed Yusuf, who was taken into police custody and killed in June 2009 following a bloody uprising.  Meanwhile, Alhaji Kashim Shettima, former state health commissioner, has replaced Alhaji Gubio as ANPP gubernatorial aspirant.

Governor Sheriff dismissed the killings as “political,” without a religious motive. But on 2 February, Boko Haram reaffirmed its jihadst intentions.  As they had done following last Christmas Eve’s bomb blasts in Maiduguri, the “warriors” of the sect transformed the city into a stage for political theater. In the dead of night some invisible hands posted A-4 sized posters all around the town.  Beside the group’s formal name, Jama’atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda’awati Wal-Jihad, the posters carried movement’s AQIM-inspired logo and an open declaration that it is waging jihad "in an effort to establish Sharia system of government in the country."  The Arabic language message also claimed responsibility for Gubio’s death as well as attacks in nearby Bauchi State.  The message went further to threaten full scale war in the country "starting from Borno and extending it as far as Lagos if Sharia system of government was not introduced in Nigeria."

Security agencies in Borno, Bauchi, and other affected states have been provided 450 vehicles and motorcycles to reinforce their efforts to stop Boko Haram and other violent attacks. The Joint Police/Military Taskforce (JMPT) deployed to Borno State has also initiated a stop and search strategy for eight key locations around the city.  It is called “Stop, Search and Raise Your Arms.” 

In Boko Haram’s interview with the BBC Hausa Service on 8 February, a leader Malam Abu Suleiman laid down conditions for truce in Borno State: “We want our mosque to be given back to us. We also want all the soldiers in Maiduguri to be withdrawn immediately,” he said.  This last demand is unlikely to be met.

Surprisingly, no charges have been brought for the murders of Gubio and the other victims of the 28 January attacks.  The Maiduguri high court has granted bail to 65 Boko Haram suspects arrested in connection with the killings.  The charges are for “holding unlawful assembly” in Maiduguri and its environs and “breaching public peace.”  These are light charges for a group that police call the “biggest headache” for security in the county.  Is the elite establishment treating Boko Haram, and its evident powers to cause mayhem with kid gloves?  Is the group proving “useful” to some political (or financial) interests? Are there politicians perhaps among the sect’s current or former members – as some commentators have alleged?

Bauchi State. The assassination weekend of January 28 in Maiduguri was preceded on Wednesday 26^th by violence in neighboring Bauchi State.  It seems to have broken out over a triviality – a game of billiards. The incident erupted into violence as Muslim youths started attacking and burning Christian’s properties. Some claim that weapons and mercenaries had been prepared in expectation of a “triggering incident.”   Anywhere from 25 to 96 people were killed in the Tafawa Balewa and Bogoro areas, which have large Christian populations. Violence continued as Christians mobilized a counter attack.  The incident followed a prior clash around 1^st February, when police reported 31 bodies buried in the same areas. 

Jos and environs. In Plateau State the deep-seated rivalries between local minority farming groups and the historically powerful Muslim Hausa-Fulani herders have flared again. More than 200 people have been killed in the Jos area since December. Old tensions rooted in control of farmlands have been compounded in the democratic era by fierce competition for political power associated with land resources and their corresponding electoral boundaries – which guarantee rents from government funds. 

Almost daily reports of communal killings, typically attributed to clashes between armed Muslim herdsmen and Christian villagers, build up the toll of deaths. The sheer pressure of poverty, dispossession and class envy must also be added to the motives.  For example, twenty cattle rustlers who attacked the soil conservation college in the Jos suburb of Vom on February 10 were not after people but rather the 30 head of cattle belonging to the college security officer.  In the raid, five people were shot dead, including a child.   In a similar incident, it was “have-nots” who attacked the “haves” -- students on their way to class -- at the University of Jos.  This shocking incident and its aftermath were described in graphic terms in an emailed letter from a longstanding expatriate resident …

2 Feb

This past weekend was particularly awful. After a fight on Friday between some okada [motorbike] riders and some students of UniJos, a hellish scenario was let loose in Jos. The students attempted to demonstrate, and soldiers trying to keep them in the campus shot some of them (not fatally). The situation allowed youth gangs of both Christians and Muslims in the area of the university (the northern part of the city) to embark on a rampage of killing and burning of properties of other faiths. The conflict spread to some neighbouring villages, and to some other parts of the town. In the end, the whole of Farin Gada area of Jos was completely destroyed. This includes a couple of square km of the mechanics' village where about 80% of mechanics in Jos are located, including many sellers of spare parts. Some mosques and churches were burnt, as well as many houses and several petrol stations. The main regional vegetable market, from where most of the produce destined for Lagos, Abuja and Port Harcourt is loaded, was also completely destroyed, including the wholesale onion and tomato market. The area is completely devastated and is currently occupied by the army, with restricted movement in the area. The town is generally very tense, as everyone is expecting that there might be some retaliation attacks, and people are again afraid to move around.

By 1 February 2011 the government had deployed a first batch of 500 new troops to reinforce members of the special task force “Operation Safe Haven.” The move was an admission that the task force that had served for more than a year in the Jos area was minimally effective. Beleaguered residents complained they may even have been complicit in the raids against them.  The change in personnel and strategy seems to have been positive, at least from the perspective of our letter writer…

9 Feb

We still hear rumours of incidents in different parts of the town, but the military patrols have been increased, and more soldiers added to the task force. Air Force helicopters are constantly flying overhead all around Jos and environs, and hopefully these measures will deter more large scale violence.

Sadly, the writer’s hope for future peace was not to be.  Attacks continued in neighboring Benue State on 6 February and then resumed in Jos and Maiduguri on the 15th.

Benue State.  Conflicts between herdsmen and farmers are woven into the fabric of life in Nigeria’s Middle Belt.  Their intensity in recent years has escalated with growing political competition over land and oil resource rents, often cynically fueled by appeals to religious differences.  Another cycle of armed clashes began in Benue State on Monday 6 February, when Fulani herdsmen mounted on horseback and motocycles launched a series of nocturnal attacks in the Tyotegh council ward of Gwer-West LGA in retaliation for the alleged killing of their cattle by villagers.  In the first day, 10 persons were killed, 3,000 displaced, and 25 homes torched.  A week later the constant night raids had razed 100 homesteads and displaced 20,000 villagers residing in 10 villages in the council. The death toll in the conflict has risen to about 28 persons, with more than 300 persons critically injured, many with bullet wounds. It was reported that several women and girls in the area were allegedly raped by the invading bandits who :over-powered the communities and confounded security agencies with their coordinated pattern of attack and retreat.

And then more …

On 15 February the Eid'l Maulud celebration of the Prophet’s birthday President Jonathan delivered a special message to the nation stressing that his government would pay more attention to the protection of lives and property. His good intentions were tragically marred by a replay of violence in both Jos and Maiduguri. In Jos authorities had already cancelled a parade planned for the Muslim holiday. But in this tense city, a tiny spark – a policeman’s purchase of meat from a butcher -- set off a chain of events that left around a dozen dead.  According to reports, the butcher slashed the man apparently without provocation.  A little girl nearby was also stabbed but made a bloody escape. (In this context, the meat sellers were Muslim, the customers Christian.)  Pandemonium spread through the market as sellers closed shops.  Christian youth killed a Hausa motorbike driver, while Muslim worshippers reacted to a rumored reprisal attack on their mosque.  The clash was restrained by the arrival of commander of the Special Task Force, Brig. Gen. Hassan Umaru.  Four persons were arrested. Elsewhere a “stampede” in the Gada Biyu area of the city led to three deaths.

Meanwhile, in Maiduguri, a Church in the Gomari area was attacked and defended by firing soldiers. Involvement of Boko Haram is speculated but unknown.

Impact of violence on attitudes toward elections in the North Central Zone.  A December 2010 public opinion survey by the International Republican Institute (IRI, US) showed that among large national ethnic groups, the Tiv (a predominant ethnic group in Benue State) were the most likely to consider violence (49%) an obstacle to free and fair elections. People living in the North Central zone (which includes Plateau and Benue) in the same survey had the least confidence of all geopolitical zones that their votes would be counted fairly.  The pattern of violence is shaking their belief in Nigeria’s democratic system.

II. - THE NIGER DELTA AND NEARBY STATES

In comparison to the North-Central and North-West Zones, the South-South and Niger Delta area was relatively peaceful throughout the voter registration period and the campaign events that followed.  However, in nearby Enugu State in the South-East on 19 February police found a bomb planted under a seat on the VIP stand for an upcoming PDP campaign rally. It was disarmed, saving many lives. The bomb was believed to have been planted by an opposition party.

To curb armed crime and electoral intimidation, police have begun to offer rewards in Imo and other states for information on activities involving arms and arms smuggling.  On February 12 a local arms dealer was arrested, seven assault rifles seized, and 4,000 rounds of ammunition taken.  A reward of $6,500 was paid to the informant.  The arrested dealer provided further information about the businessmen in the smuggling chain who had hired him to deliver the weapons.

The December 2010 public opinion survey by the IRI disaggregated popular expectations about election violence and election rigging by state. 

·         In response to the statement “The state I live in will suffer more violence than the rest of the country,” Ondo State has low agreement (1), whereas Edo, Akwa Ibom and Imo State showed very strong levels of agreement (53-87). 

·         There was less agreement overall in the Niger Delta with the statement “The state I live in will suffer more vote-rigging than the rest of the country,” with Ondo State having least (1), Rivers some (19) and Akwa-Ibom a great deal (67).

The bitter rivalry in Bayelsa State between incumbent governor Timipre Sylva (PDP) and ex-presidential adviser on the Amnesty and ex- MD of the NDDC Timi Alaibe (Labor Party) Past violence against the Alaibe and Labor Party rallies could be repeated. Political thuggery is a potential danger area throughout the region during the election period.

Akwa-Ibom state risks a high level of political kidnappings, say some of its sons and daughters living in the disapora.  Protest marches are being organized in major cities in the US and Europe on February 26 to protest the high rate of murder, kidnappings and other serious crimes in their state, many of which go unpunished without explanation.  The implication is that kidnapping may be growing into a large political enterprise, protected by the state.  The Governor has said the marches are “Conceived By Covetousness, Bigotry & Hate.”  

Continued in Part 2