By Emeka Monye
Fela Anikulapo-Kuti had a word for it: “Government Magic.” In the track, the Afrobeat pioneer captured a Nigerian political tradition that predates the Fourth Republic—the sudden transformation of figures, narratives, and outcomes to fit the ambitions of those in power. He was singing about the 1979 and 1983 elections, but the chorus feels uncomfortably familiar today. The instruments have changed. The stage is bigger. Yet the choreography of doubt around election results remains.
The political class, as Fela dissected in song after song, has always understood the value of controlling the story before, during, and after the polls. The goal is not just to win, but to win in a way that makes dissent look irrational. When the numbers bend to serve whims and caprices, the public’s faith in the process bends with them. That is why the credibility of internal party primaries matters. They are rehearsals for the national performance. If the rehearsal collapses into farce, the main show risks losing its audience.
The recent All Progressives Congress presidential primary result has reignited that old conversation. According to reports circulating from the party, President Bola Tinubu emerged as the APC candidate for the 2027 presidential election with a tally exceeding 10 million votes. On its face, the figure is striking. It is also the source of the current controversy. Across social media, videos and screenshots purporting to show the counting process have fueled questions about the arithmetic behind the result. The clips show delegates and officials tallying votes in what appears to be a linear, one-by-one sequence. Then, without a visible change in method or volume, the totals jump to figures in the tens of thousands.
That kind of progression violates basic expectations of how counting works. Arithmetic progression moves step by step: one, two, three, four. What people observed looked closer to geometric progression—small, manageable numbers suddenly leaping into magnitudes that do not match the visible process. To the average voter watching at home, it does not read as a technical anomaly. It reads as a sleight of hand. And in politics, perception is often as consequential as procedure.
The problem is not the ambition of a large turnout. A party primary with millions of participants is plausible if the structure supports it. The problem is the disconnect between what was seen and what was announced. When the mechanics of counting defy standard arithmetic, the burden falls on the party to explain the method. Was this an aggregation of state-level results? Were multiple counting centers involved? Was there a digital component that was not visible in the clips? Without that context, the silence becomes an explanation in itself, and not a reassuring one.
This matters because the signal from a party primary extends beyond the party. It sets a tone for the general election that follows. If internal contests normalize questionable tallies, it becomes harder to draw a line at the national level. It erodes the cultural expectation that numbers should add up, that observers should be able to follow the process, and that the loser should be able to concede without feeling gaslit. Once that expectation erodes, every subsequent election starts from a deficit of trust.
Nigeria’s history with elections makes this sensitivity unavoidable. Fela’s “Government Magic” resonated in the 1980s precisely because voters had watched results shift between the polling unit and the collation center. The trauma of that era did not disappear because new technology arrived. It evolved. Today, the magic happens in parallel—on the field and on timelines. A video can travel faster than a press statement. A 30-second clip can frame a narrative that a 10-page report cannot undo. In that environment, transparency is not a luxury. It is risk management.
The APC’s position as the ruling party increases the stakes. When the party in power announces results that strain credibility, the opposition, civil society, and international observers all take note. It feeds into a broader narrative about democratic backsliding that Nigeria has been working to resist. It also gives ammunition to those who argue that elections are theater and that the outcome is decided long before voters mark a ballot. That is a dangerous argument to validate, even unintentionally.
There is also a generational dimension. The younger voters who make up a growing share of the electorate are digital natives. They expect processes to be visible, verifiable, and timestamped. They are not satisfied with appeals to tradition or authority when the data does not align. For them, a counting process that leaps from single digits to five figures without an explanation looks less like “strategy” and more like contempt for their intelligence. That is not a base you want to alienate before a general election.
None of this is to say that the APC intended to undermine its own credibility. Party primaries are complex, high-pressure events. Aggregating results from 36 states and the FCT, coordinating delegates, managing security, and communicating in real time is not simple. Mistakes happen. Miscommunications happen. But the response to those mistakes determines whether they become scandals. A prompt, detailed breakdown of how the 10 million figure was reached—with state-by-state tallies, observer sign-off, and a clear explanation of the counting method—would close the loop. Silence and defensiveness keep it open.
The political class would do well to remember that legitimacy is a renewable resource, but only if you invest in it. Every election cycle offers a chance to rebuild trust or deplete it further. The current moment is a test. If the APC can demonstrate that its primary was both massive and methodical, it strengthens the case for its own mandate. If it cannot, it hands its opponents a narrative that will outlast the 2027 campaign.
Beyond the APC, the broader lesson is for all parties. The era where results could be announced and accepted without explanation is over. The public has access to more information, more cameras, and more ways to compare what was said with what was seen. That is not a problem to be managed through messaging. It is a reality to be designed for. That means building primaries and elections around verifiable processes: clear protocols, independent observation, real-time data release, and audit trails that can withstand public scrutiny.
Leadership also requires admitting when the process has gaps. A leader cannot succeed without a good support team, but that team must include people willing to say, “This does not look right, and we need to fix it.” The younger generation watching these events is not asking for perfection. They are asking for honesty. They are asking for a system that respects arithmetic and respects them. Giving them space in leadership means giving them a process they can believe in, even when they lose.
The danger of ignoring this is not abstract. When vote counting looks arbitrary, voter turnout suffers. When turnout suffers, governance suffers. When governance suffers, the cycle of disillusionment deepens. Nigeria cannot afford another decade where elections are seen as rituals rather than decisions. The country’s challenges—security, economy, education, healthcare—require a public that believes its vote can influence who makes those decisions.
Fela’s critique was not about cynicism. It was about accountability. He held up a mirror to power and asked it to recognize itself. That is still the task. If the APC’s primary result was legitimate, prove it with the kind of transparency that makes “Government Magic” impossible. If there were errors, correct them publicly and show how the process will change. That is how you turn a moment of doubt into a foundation for trust.
The 2027 election will not be decided on social media. But the climate in which it is contested is being shaped there now. Every unexplained anomaly, every dismissive response, every jump from one to ten thousand without a visible step in between, adds weight to the narrative that the game is rigged. And once that narrative takes hold, even a perfectly conducted election struggles to overcome it.
The political class has been called upon to ensure that their supporters do not cause mayhem as the country heads for the polls. That responsibility starts long before Election Day. It starts with how parties conduct their own affairs, how they count their own votes, and how they explain their own results. Democracy is not just about winning. It is about winning in a way that the country can recognize as its own.
Nigeria needs more people of conscience in positions where they can influence process, not just outcomes. People who understand that a clean process is the best defense against a dirty result. People who are willing to give the younger generation not just a seat at the table, but a table that is built on rules everyone can see and follow.
If the APC wants its 2027 candidacy to be judged on policy, record, and vision, it must first secure the legitimacy of the path that produced it. That is not a favor to the opposition. It is a service to the country. Because in the end, the only magic that sustains democracy is the ordinary, unglamorous work of making the numbers add up—and showing your work while you do it.
Emeka Monye Is A Journalist
