A founding chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Mr Osita Okechukwu, has hailed the re-election of Anambra State Governor, Prof. Charles Chukwuma Soludo, describing it as practical evidence that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is not driving Nigeria towards a one-party state.
Speaking to journalists in Abuja on Sunday, Okechukwu said the result of the Anambra governorship poll was a bold counter-argument to recurring claims that APC’s dominance at the centre — coupled with waves of defections from opposition figures — was a ploy to suffocate the political space.
He said those who predicted that the ruling party would rig or “capture” the election had now been placed in check by the very outcome they feared.
According to him, Soludo’s victory under APGA — against the expectations of some opposition pundits — is all the empirical proof required.
“If APC wanted a one-party state, it had all the machinery to shove Soludo aside. Why then did APC lose?” Okechukwu asked.
The former Director-General of the Voice of Nigeria argued that defections into the APC are not products of coercion or manipulation, but the result of what he termed the PDP’s self-inflicted mistakes — particularly the breach of zoning — as well as the growing resonance for Tinubu’s policy interventions which, he said, are beginning to reflect across the country.
He described the one-party state narrative as “lazy, ahistorical, and driven by fear rather than evidence,” recalling that even when the PDP was in power, some of its leaders boasted of ruling Nigeria for 60 years until that dominance collapsed under the weight of national pushback.
“It took Tinubu — working with other patriots — to break that claim,” Okechukwu stated.
He maintained that Nigeria still has genuine choices and alternatives, stressing that the Anambra outcome is a practical demonstration that voters still have room to pick across party lines.
Okechukwu urged Soludo to be magnanimous in victory and use his return mandate to consolidate development gains, while also thanking President Tinubu for allowing a fair contest — which, he said, is the hallmark of responsible democratic leadership and a rebuke to the “one-party state” fear merchants.
The Guardian reports that Soludo was declared re-elected as governor of Anambra state for a second term by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on Sunday.
Soludo, according to the INEC, won in all the 21 local government areas of the state in the governorship election that was held on Saturday.
INEC ’s Returning Officer, Prof Edoba Omoregie (SAN), who declared the results, stated that Soludo, who was the candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), secured a total of 422,664 votes to beat other contestants.
He declared other results as follows: APC – 99,445; YPP 37,753; LP -10,576; ADC – 8208; PDP – 1401; AA -1145; AAC – 292; and ZLP 453, among others.
He stated that a total of 27,888,64 registered voters, while 598,229 were accredited for the election. He added that the total votes cast in the election were 595,298 votes while a total of 584,054 votes were valid and 11,244 votes were rejected.
