By Amos Aar
IT is apparent that the people of Benue State have become politically enlightened since 2015 as evident in their style of voting that sweeps away many elected political office holders and rejects undeserving new aspirants jostling to occupy positions based on some yardsticks set in the minds of the electorate.
Although since the return of uninterrupted democracy in 1999, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had been sweeping all elective positions during elections, the polls were said to have always been rigged and, in many cases, voting materials were not even seen by voters but votes were counted and added up.
However, in the wake of political awareness in 2015, the choices of the masses started reflecting in the votes they cast, though with the influence and instrumentality of few political gladiators that brought about change. That was the year an exiting governor of the state, Gabriel Suswam, failed in his bid to head to the senate and he also could not plant his successor. That was also the first time since 1999 that a PDP gubernatorial flagbearer lost at the general elections. That was when Samuel Ortom of the All Progressives Congress (APC) floored a former speaker of the State House of Assembly, Hon. Terhemen Tarzoor, of the PDP to become governor.
But one thing is not certain about the style of voting by the Benue electorate whether they are politically enlightened and are speaking through the ballot or they angrily uproot a particular political party when they are fed up with it regardless of some good eggs present in the party. In doing this, almost all, if not all candidates of an affected political party, are thrown out at polls instead of voting good candidates based on competence across party lines.
In the 2019 general elections, almost all APC candidates lost their bids including sitting senators like Engr Barnabas Gemade and George Akume while the PDP swept almost all the positions.
Now, in the ongoing 2023 general elections and with the presidential and National Assembly elections conducted so far, the APC has cleared almost all the seats, leaving just one senatorial seat and a House of Representatives slot for the PDP in the state.
Some people have attributed the sweeping victory being achieved by the APC to the wave of change brought in Benue State by a Catholic priest, Rev. Fr. Hyacinth Iormem Alia, who is the gubernatorial candidate of the party.
But shortly after the elections conducted last Saturday, lamentations abound in Benue State over the loss of some good candidates who had been tested and trusted with positions but were voted out in the name of sweeping change.
Many people in Makurdi/Guma federal constituency wondered why Hon. Benjamin Mzondu of the PDP who represents them was kicked out despite the numerous tangible constituency projects he attracted to them. Others say Governor Ortom, as senator, would have been a sound voice for Benue zone B given his firm stance on what is conceived as ‘truth, justice and equity’ as well as anti-open grazing of cattle in the whole of Benue State.
There were also loud lamentations over the rejection of some other first-time aspirants on the platform of other political parties who would have performed creditably well, judging from their track records of achievements in previous public positions.
Following the intimidating victory recorded by the APC in the NASS election, the party is already celebrating Rev. Fr. Hyacinth Alia as the next governor of Benue State, believing that it’s time for the APC to win all, and that Fr. Alia is the brain behind the success of the party including the victory of the APC’s presidential candidate in the state, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, in spite of Governor Ortom’s support for Peter Obi of the Labour Party.
It is therefore obvious that Benue people are yet to be fully educated and enlightened about voting competent candidates rather than strict allegiance to political parties.
