The 2007 presidential election should have been a milestone: for the first time, one elected Nigerian president would hand over to another. Instead it is remembered as one of the most flawed votes in the country’s history. Umaru Musa Yar’Adua of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was declared the winner with about 70% of the vote. Within weeks of taking office, he admitted that the process that brought him to power needed reform.

The road to 2007

President Olusegun Obasanjo was barred from a third term. In May 2006 the Senate threw out constitutional amendments that would have allowed him to run again, a moment many Nigerians saw as a defence of the two-term limit. The PDP then nominated Yar’Adua, the low-profile governor of Katsina State, with Goodluck Jonathan, governor of Bayelsa, as his running mate.

The opposition was split. Muhammadu Buhari ran again for the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP). Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, who had fallen out with Obasanjo, ran for the Action Congress (AC). INEC, led by Maurice Iwu, tried to disqualify Atiku over corruption allegations, but the Supreme Court ruled days before the vote that INEC had no power to do so. Ballot papers had to be reprinted at the last minute to include him, and many arrived late and without the planned serial numbers.

The result

INEC announced the result on 23 April 2007, two days after the vote.

Candidate Party Votes Share
Umaru Musa Yar’Adua PDP 24,638,063 about 70%
Muhammadu Buhari ANPP 6,605,299 about 18%
Atiku Abubakar AC 2,637,848 about 7%

The governorship and state assembly elections held a week earlier, on 14 April, had already been marked by violence and fraud. In several states, results were later overturned by tribunals.

“Not credible”: what observers found

The verdicts were unusually blunt. The European Union observer mission said the polls could not be considered credible, citing fraud, violence, disenfranchisement and bias. Its chief observer, Max van den Berg, said the election had fallen far short of basic international standards. The Catholic Bishops’ Conference, drawing on reports from tens of thousands of church observers, said Nigeria had failed to hold free, fair and credible elections. Local monitors recorded polling units where far more votes were counted than there were registered voters.

Human Rights Watch estimated that at least 300 people were killed in violence linked to the 2007 elections. It described gangs seizing ballot boxes in states such as Katsina, Gombe and Rivers, and politicians using armed groups to control results.

In his inaugural speech on 29 May 2007, Yar’Adua acknowledged that the election had shortcomings. He set up the Electoral Reform Committee, led by former Chief Justice Mohammed Uwais, to recommend changes.

The petitions and a 4–3 Supreme Court ruling

Buhari and Atiku both challenged the result. The Presidential Election Petition Tribunal dismissed their cases in February 2008. On 12 December 2008, the Supreme Court upheld Yar’Adua’s election by a narrow four to three majority. The three dissenting justices would have ordered a fresh election, the closest any presidential petition has come to succeeding in Nigeria.

Reform after 2007

The Uwais committee reported in December 2008. It recommended making INEC financially independent, shifting the burden of proof in election cases to the electoral body, and creating separate commissions for electoral offences and party registration. Not all of its proposals became law, but the Electoral Act 2010 and the appointment of Attahiru Jega to lead INEC in 2010 grew directly out of the debate it started.

Yar’Adua fell ill in late 2009 and died in office on 5 May 2010. Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan, already serving as acting president, was sworn in the next day.

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