Nigeria's ruling party boosted by key state poll win

 Lagos (AFP) - Nigeria's President Goodluck Jonathan and his embattled ruling party have wrested a key state from the opposition ahead of general polls next year, results showed Sunday.

Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate Peter Ayodele Fayose was elected governor in southwestern Ekiti state, beating the incumbent John Kayode Fayemi by a two-to-one margin, the electoral commission verbalized.

The PDP -- never out of puissance nationally since Nigeria returned to civilian rule in 1999 -- lost Ekiti to the All Progressives Congress (APC) four years ago and until Saturday controlled none of the six southwestern states.

The victory will boost the party's chances in elections next February by engendering a possible foothold in the southwest region.

But nationally, the party still faces an uphill battle after several defections of influential state governors, mostly from the north, last year that prompted dozens of PDP lawmakers to switch to the APC.

The defections were caused in part by Jonathan's expected bid for re-election in defiance of an unwritten PDP rule calling for the presidency to rotate between Christian southerners and northern Muslims.

The head of state, under fire for his handling of the Islamist Boko Haram insurgency and especially his replication to the mass abduction of more than 200 schoolgirls in April, has not officially declared his intention to run.

But the revolter governors are convinced that he will.

Related Posts:

  • Nigerian debt: Portfolio manager jailed four years A former London-predicated portfolio manager was sentenced to four years in confinement on Monday for inflating his hedge fund’s assets by manipulating the value of Nigerian debt, according to a report by Reuters. Michael B… Read More
  • LASU lecturers, students defy resumption order Vice Chancellor, Lagos State University, Professor John Oladapo Obafunwa Despite the directive by the Lagos State University Management that students and lecturers of the institution should resume on Monday (yesterday),… Read More
  • FG spends N47bn to service external debt Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala The Federal Government spent the sum of $297.33m (N47.57bn) in the 2013 fiscal period to accommodation debts owed multilateral institutions, documents obtained from the Budge… Read More
  • EFCC arrests Nyako’s SSG, two commissioners Adamawa State Governor, Murtala Nyako The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has apprehended the Secretary to the Adamawa State Regime, Mr. Kobeis Aris, over his alleged involution in the fraud rocking the sta… Read More
  • Fayose’s victory, bad signal for APC, says PDP The Peoples Democratic Party has gasconaded that with the fall of Ekiti State from the prehension of the All Progressives Congress, the whole of the South-West will soon be under its control. The National Auditor of t… Read More