With the presidential election just around the corner, our correspondents write that the battle, which is a straight one between President Goodluck Jonathan and General Muhammadu Buhari, may spring some surprisesAs Nigerians, nay the world, wait for the March 28 presidential election and the 10 competing political parties putting finishing touches to their strategies, the actual contest, political watchers have submitted, is between the incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan of the Peoples Democratic Party and Maj. Gen. Muhammadu Buhari (retd.) of the All Progressives Congress.How would the scenario look like in the country's 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, when the battle is fought, won and lost'AbiaPresident Jonathan of the PDP is expected to win the presidential poll in Abia State as his party remains the dominant one there. The PDP's strong base in the state coupled with the position of Governor Theodore Orji as the Coordinator of Jonathan's Campaign Organisation in the South-East zone has further boosted Jonathan's chances at the poll. Abia parades an army of people and accomplished Nigerians who are of the PDP family and they have been working assiduously to deliver their various localities to the President. Some of them include: Nigeria's High Commissioner to Canada, Chief Ojo Maduekwe; former PDP National Chairman, Vincent Ogbulafor; former Senate President Adulphus Wabara; Minister of Finance, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala; Gen. Ike Nwachukwu ( retd); among a host of others.Jonathan's marital tie with Abia State is also expected to boost his chances. The mother of the First Lady, Patience Jonathan, hailed from Abia and the state enjoys a very warm relationship with the First Family.AbujaAbuja, the seat of power, should ordinarily be the star on the crown of the eventual winner of the Presidential elections. However, the territory which some refer to as a city of civil servants is likely to be almost evenly split between Jonathan and Buhari.Senator Philip Aduda (PDP) is expected to lead other public and political office holders to mobilise votes for the President because the FCT Minister, Senator Bala Mohammed; would be required to go back to Bauchi where he hails from to join the governor and the party's national chairman, Adamu Mua'azu to campaign for the President. Aduda, however, has to contend with a former political opponent, Adamu Sidi-Ali, who apart from contesting for a Senate seat is also mobilising support for Buhari and the APC. That Abuja is where the President has lived for six years counts for a lot but the large number of northerners in the city is also a plus for Buhari. Verdict: It's too close to call.AdamawaIt is a state of political gladiators and all of them will want to make a point. The state boasts of ex-Vice President Atiku Abubakar of the APC; Buhari's wife; former Chairman of the PDP, Bamanga Tukur; ex-EFCC Chairman, Nuhu Ribadu, among others.It would have been an easy ride for the PDP, but for the Boko Haram menace that has claimed many lives.The opinion of political analysts in the state is that despite the successes recorded in Mubi and many other towns, many indigenes are not impressed because they believe that the President launched the late war on the insurgents to score a political point.Hence, it looks like a tight race between Buhari and Jonathan despite the fact that PDP won the state in 2011.Akwa IbomBoth the PDP and the APC are popular in Akwa Ibom State. Each of these two political parties exercises dominance in some sections of the state.The people of Oro ethnic nationality (the largest ethnic group in Akwa Ibom South Senatorial District with five local government areas) are mainly against the PDP.The people, who embrace APC hold that if Oro continues to remain in the PDP, the probability for them to produce a governor in the next 40 years will be slim.Other areas with strong support APC base are Uruan; Ibeno; Ikot Abasi; Esit Eket; Abak Federal Constituency otherwise known as Abak Five; Itu; Ini; Ikono. The party has also encroached into areas like Ikot Ekpene; Essien Udim, where the PDP has strongholds.However, Governor Godswill Akpabio who is an ardent loyalist of Jonathan is expected to deliver the state to PDP coupled with the South-East support for Jonathan.AnambraIn 2011, President Jonathan of the PDP polled 1,145,169 million votes or 98.8 per cent of the total votes cast in Anambra State.From the statistics, Anambra gave Jonathan the highest proportion of votes in the country. His closest rival was the Congress Progressives Congress candidate, Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, who polled 4,223 votes.The situation on the ground shows that Jonathan still has an edge over Buhari and will very likely win the presidential election in the state.The sentiments that worked well for Jonathan in 2011 are still very much around. But the party has lost a lot of followers, who though may not move over to vote Buhari, may remain indifferent.The factors playing in favour of Jonathan include the incumbency factor. The party in power in the state, the All Progressives Grand Alliance, has also adopted Jonathan as its presidential candidate.This adds to the advantage of Jonathan being the official candidate of the biggest opposition party in the state.Jonathan is likely to win but with a diminished margin as against the result in 2011 when he scored 98 per cent of the votes.BauchiWith the National Chairman of the PDP, Adamu Mu'azu, the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Senator Bala Mohammed and Governor Isa Yuguda, President Jonathan should expect to garner a substantial number of votes or at least 25 per cent of the votes. However, this can only happen if the three resolve their differences and decide to work together. Buhari's popularity among the ordinary folk in the state is unlikely to wane before the March 28 election. Buhari is most likely to carry the day.BayelsaIn Bayelsa, the home state of President Jonathan, it is almost a taboo to mention any other political party except the PDP.The emergence of the rival opposition political party, the APC, has yet to change the people's perception about the PDP. Also, the APC has yet to entrench itself as a formidable party in the state. Observers believe that in Bayelsa, the general election is fait accompli for the PDP as the party has formidable structures in the state compared to the APC and other political parties.BenueHere the two candidates' chances stand at 55 per cent for Jonathan and 45 for Buhari. Though a PDP controlled state, the people of the state complain endlessly of non-payment of salaries which they say has been the bane of the government. The state is agrarian with a high dominance of civil servants in the elite class.Having the civil servants objecting to any government spells near defeat for such administration. This is what has put the PDP on the path of declined popularity. However, Jonathan still stands slightly higher than Buhari in the reckoning of the people. Also, Senate President David Mark will want to make a good showing in his state.BornoIn Borno, Buhari has been a political factor since the first day he declared his ambition to contest the presidency of Nigeria in 2007. He has always come first while his opponents, Olusegun Obasanjo, Umaru Yar'Adua and the current one, Jonathan, came a far second. He is idolised by the people of the state, it can even been said that he is more loved in the state than in his home state of Katsina because he lost there to Umaru Yar'Adua in 2007. He has never lost any election in Borno where he is seen as a role model and anyone that seeks political office has to come via him.The love for Buhari was said to have started when he was the military governor in Maiduguri, which was the then capital of the North-East state and till date, he is still loved as if those days were moments away.As it stands today, Buhari will get a landslide victory over Jonathan in Borno.Cross RiverIn Cross River State, it is obvious where the pendulum will swing in the March 28 presidential election. This is so because it is one of the few states in the South-South region that is completely controlled by the PDP.Candidates of the ruling party won the entire senatorial and House of Representatives seats in the 2011 election. The party also produced the governor and 24 out of 25 members of the state House of Assembly. It also has in its kitty, all the 18 Local Government Area chairmen and 196 councillors.Apart from an almost overwhelming victory for the PDP presidential candidate, votes based on ethnic sentiment might also go in favour of President Jonathan because the electorate thinks that the two-term tenure of a candidate from the region must be upheld.DeltaIn Delta, President Jonathan stands head and shoulders above his closest rival, Buhari.A number of factors are playing in favour of the President in the state and one of them is the fact that he is from the South-South geopolitical zone. The people of Delta, would rather vote their own than support someone else from another geopolitical zone.According to Bunor Agbomedarho, a former banker and House of Assembly aspirant, the people of Delta State will not throw away their son for whatever reason. 'He is from here and we will give it to him naturally,' he said.In addition to that, the coastal areas of the state, where block votes usually emerge from to determine eventual winners of most of the presidential and governorship elections are peopled by Jonathan's Ijaw ethnic group.Apart from the ethnic factor, those who now control affairs in the coastal areas, fall among the ex-Niger Delta militants that have benefitted heavily from the Federal Government under Jonathan.Another factor that plays in favour of Jonathan is the incumbent factor in Delta where his party, the PDP, is ruling.EbonyiThis is another South-East state where the PDP and its presidential candidate, Jonathan, have an edge over the opposition.The attempt to impeach Governor Martins Elechi, who has a strong support at the grassroots, at some point threatened to undermine Jonathan's re-election campaign in the state. There were indications that most of the governor's supporters would have voted against the President in protest, had Elechi been impeached before the elections.The dark cloud has, however, cleared after the Ebonyi State House of Assembly reportedly suspended the impeachment process.EdoEdo has a total of 1,779,738 registered voters. But the APC currently holds sway as the ruling party in Edo State, having defeated the PDP in the 2007 and 2012 governorship elections.Like in other states in the South-South, ethnicity is considered a major factor, which would attract support for the PDP and Jonathan in the March 28 poll, as it did in 2011, when it secured the majority votes in the state, irrespective of the political parties.Since the inception of the opposition party, Buhari has become seemingly popular across the state, compared to 2003, 2007 and 2011 presidential elections, where his campaigns were more pronounced in Auchi, an area largely dominated by Muslims. Also, Governor Adams Oshiomhole has a large following and can swing votes Buhari's way. The Chairman of the APC, John Odigie-Oyegun, who is from the state will want to prove that he is a chairman indeed despite the political sagacity of Chief Tony Anenih who is a force to reckon with.EkitiEvents in Ekiti recently suggest a tilt in the balance between the popularity of the ruling PDP and the opposition APC. Although Governor Ayodele Fayose has continued to enjoy the support of the grassroots, it is observed these days that his large following in the state is fast depleting in ranks. This may not be unconnected with the squabbles over the primaries of the party conducted in December last year. The division in the State House of Assembly is also a minus for the PDP as the legislators who are anti-Fayose are not keen on getting their supporters to vote for Jonathan.The opposition seems to be gathering momentum especially with the return of the governorship candidate of the Labour Party, Opeyemi Bamidele, to the APC.Bamidele who declared support for Buhari has deployed his political platform, the Ekiti Bibire Coalition, for the mission.The talk in town is that this general election is different from the governorship election when people mobilised and voted Fayose. It is a common trend to see people shouting 'sai Buhari' on the streets of Ado Ekiti.EnuguIn Enugu, President Jonathan is expected to get more votes than Buhari and other presidential candidates.This expectation is based on the fact that, among the 36 states in the country, Enugu is arguably one of the states where the PDP has the strongest followership.There is hardly any prominent politician that is campaigning against Jonathan in Enugu at the moment ' even some 'aggrieved' former PDP members who joined other political parties in order to realise their political ambitions in the 2015 polls are including the President's pictures in their campaign posters.The politicians with the largest support bases in the state are all campaigning for Jonathan ' these include Governor Sullivan Chime, Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu, former Senate President Ken Nnamani, and a former governor of old Anambra State, Chief Jim Nwobodo, among several others.GombeThis is likely to be one of the most keenly contested states in the North because just as General Buhari, enjoys a large following, the state Governor, Ibrahim Dankwambo, the Minister of Transportation, Senator Idris Umar and the Deputy National Publicity Secretary of the ruling PDP, Abdullahi Jalo, who are ardent supporters of President Jonathan, have a point to prove. They will be up against a former governor of the state, Senator Danjuma Goje who is a stalwart of the APC.ImoLike other South-East states, President Jonathan waxes strong in Imo. The fact that he has been adopted by main Igbo socio-cultural groups has made him stronger in this state. In Imo, it is Jonathan, even though Gov. Rochas Okorocha of the APC, who is the only South-East governor in the party, will want to show his might and popularity.http://www.punchng.com/news/310199/#comment-2750496
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