Adamawa 2019: Bindow Absent As 13 Governorship Candidate Sign Peace Accord

Adamawa 2019: Bindow Absent As 13 Governorship Candidate Sign Peace Accord

By Billy Graham Abel Yola

Thirteen of the twenty nine governorship candidates in Adamawa have on Thursday signed a peace accord outlawing violence, thuggery, hate speech and other actions or inactions that are capable of undermine the conduct and credibility of the 2019 elections in Adamawa but the incubent governor, Muhammed Umaru Jibrilla Bindow failed to show up for the peace pact signing.

Spearheading the signing of peace accord in Yola, the Adamawa state Resident Electoral Commissioner, Kassim Gaidam urged the candidates to respect the electoral process and maintain decorum saying the peace accord does not suggest in anyway that they have been violent.

Gaidam said electoral violence is the greatest threat to a free, fair and credible elections in Nigeria and that party in fightings has left the commission embroiled in 396 court cases and 52 petitions between August-October, 2018.

Gaidam notes that, "The high success of 2015 General Elections is largely a product of the violence free environment in which the election was conducted as well as the peace accord signed by candidates."

He added that, "It is against the foregoing background that it has become pertinent to bring together all the candidates of the political parties contesting the governorship elections in Adamawa state in 2019 to a round table under the aupices of Interagency Consultative Committee on Elections Security (ICCES) for the purpose of emphasising the need to have a violence free elections in Adamawa state in 2019 and to require the candidates to express that committment by signing this peace accord today." 

The Adamawa state commissioner of police, Abdullahi Yerima, said he is so far impressed by the orderly conduct of campaigns by politicians in the state saying no politician has demanded for coorperation of the police without getting it.

Reacting to the peace accord, the PDP governorship candidate, Ahmadu Umaru Fintiri, commended INEC for the intiative and described the absence of the incubent governor as the actions of a man already on his way out.

Fintiri said, "It is immaterial whether he is here or not, he is already an outgoing governor."

Another candidate, the governorship candidate of the Social Democratic Party, SDP, Emmanuel Bello said, "Those who want peace are here and it is unfortunate that some are not here but those really committed to peace are the once you see here."

The candidate of the All Blending Party, ABP, Daniel Shagga Ismaila, lauds INEC's efforts and challenged politicians display ideas and plans to move the state forward.

He said violence is a display of absence of ideas and acts of desperate politicians who want power at all cost.

Notable absentees at the peace accord signing are the Adamanwa state governor, Muhammed Umaru Jibrilla Bindow and the governorship candidate of the African Democratic Congress, ADC, Abdulazziz Nyako.

The absence of the Adamawa state governor is a sad narrative in the drive for peaceful elections in the state and might weaken the resolve of other politicians in honouring the peace accord.