Despite repeated warnings from INEC, EFCC, ICPC and security agencies, allegations of widespread vote buying surfaced during the August 15 Osun State governorship election, with voters reportedly offered between N15,000 and N50,000 in some polling areas.
Ahead of the election according to report, the menace of vote buying had reportedly emerged as one of the major concerns surrounding the exercise, alongside rising violence linked to rival cult groups in parts of the state.
The Independent National Electoral Commission had promised a tougher approach. INEC Chairman, Prof. Joash Amupitan, said the commission would work with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission to prevent the buying and selling of votes.
Amupitan said the practice had evolved beyond physical cash exchanges, with political actors increasingly using bank transfers and other digital methods to influence voters.
The ICPC also embarked on sensitisation campaigns across Osogbo, warning residents that both buying and selling votes were offences punishable under Nigerian law.
The commission said its operatives would be deployed across the state’s 30 local government areas on election day to monitor polling units and apprehend offenders.
But on the election day, reports from different parts of Osun suggested that the warnings did little to stop the practice.
Voters in several locations reportedly alleged that political agents offered cash, food items and promises of electronic transfers in exchange for votes.
In some areas, the inducement reportedly began before voting commenced, with food items distributed to residents as political agents sought to secure their support.
A voter in Ward 05, Boripe Local Government Area, said he was initially offered N15,000 when he arrived at his polling unit at about 10am.
He said the amount later increased to about N30,000 after he experienced difficulties with the BVAS machine and eventually prepared to vote around noon.
The voter alleged that a political party also maintained a register close to the polling unit for people who agreed to support it.
He further claimed that four female police officers at the location witnessed the alleged transactions but failed to intervene.
According to him, the practice was not restricted to election day, as residents had allegedly received N10,000 weeks earlier under what was presented as an empowerment programme.
In Ilesa East Local Government Area, another voter, Roseline, alleged that agents of the Accord Party and the All Progressives Congress offered money to voters at her polling unit in Israel Ward 8.
She claimed the price allegedly reached N40,000, adding that some voters collected the money but later voted according to their personal preferences.
Roseline also alleged that police and Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps personnel witnessed the transactions without stopping them.
Her account highlighted one of the central challenges of vote buying: while politicians can purchase access to voters, the secrecy of the ballot can make it difficult to guarantee that voters will actually support the candidate who paid them.
In Ile-Ife, another voter alleged that political inducement began with the distribution of food. He said a party agent shared a mudu of garri to people at Oja Titun before voting commenced.
He later claimed that a political agent gave him N20,000 after voting began.
The accounts point to the different forms that electoral inducement can take, ranging from direct cash payments to food distribution and promises of bank transfers.
Former INEC National Commissioner, Prof Lai Olurode, described the atmosphere around some polling locations as a “bazaar”, warning that excessive monetisation could make it difficult to determine whether voters were freely expressing their political choices.
Olurode said the problem reflected a wider culture of corruption surrounding Nigerian elections and argued that voter education should be sustained throughout the electoral cycle rather than intensified only shortly before elections.
Legal practitioner, Chief Abimbola Ige, described the alleged scale of vote buying during the election as unprecedented, claiming that some voters were offered as much as N50,000.
He described the development as a serious threat to democracy but also noted that the election’s outcome suggested that money might not always guarantee victory.
The political parties named in the allegations rejected claims that they engaged in vote buying. The spokesperson for the Ademola Adeleke Governorship Campaign Council, Pelumi Olajengbesi, denied the allegation against the governing party but claimed that about N110bn had allegedly been brought into the state ahead of the election. The claim could not be independently verified.
The Osun APC spokesperson, Kola Olabisi, also denied the allegation and challenged those making accusations against the party to provide evidence.
Despite the competing claims, reports of cash and material inducements have renewed questions about the effectiveness of Nigeria’s campaign against vote buying.
The development also raises questions about the ability of security and anti-corruption agencies to enforce electoral laws at polling units where transactions allegedly take place in plain sight.
For many voters, the immediate attraction of cash or food may be difficult to ignore amid economic hardship. But the wider consequence is that elections risk becoming contests of financial strength rather than competing ideas, policies and programmes.
The Osun experience therefore leaves a critical question for Nigeria’s electoral system: if voters can be offered tens of thousands of naira for their ballots despite repeated warnings from enforcement agencies, what will it take to make the ballot truly priceless?
