Have you recovered from the shock of the recent election in Lagos State, which saw a close contest between your party, All Progressives Congress and the Peoples Democratic Party?
I’m not sure it’s appropriate to use the word — shock. Let’s go back in history: in the 2011 elections, the President and PDP recorded 1.3 million votes in Lagos State. So for PDP to have recorded about 670,000 votes in 2015 actually means that it lost over 800,000 votes when you compare the two elections. That’s the way to look at it. Fewer people actually voted for him in Lagos State this time around. That’s the way I want to look at it. Maybe the other part is to say that the margin between APC and PDP was not much. We looked at the conduct of elections in relation to how the Independent National Electoral Commission performed. In Lagos State, you will see that in most areas, a whole lot of Lagos residents were disenfranchised due to no fault of theirs which could explain the number that came out to vote eventually. Also note that there were apprehensions before the last election; the whole place was militarised and everyone felt there would be violence and that it would not be safe. That could also account for why a whole lot of people kept away from the streets and did not come out to vote. I believe strongly that we will see a different pattern in the governorship elections.
