Nigeria goes to the polls amid Boko Haram attacks

Millions of Nigerians flocked en masse to vote in what is expected to be one of Nigeria’s tightest presidential races in its history, although hundreds fled in fear as Boko Haram extremists tried to disrupt the presidential vote with gun attacks that left 41 people dead.

The group, which wants to establish a caliphate and has allied with the Islamic State fighters in Syria and Iraq, fired at people at polling stations in the north of the country, warning them not to vote and claiming the electoral process was corrupt. In some villages, homes were said to have been torched.

Fourteen candidates are vying to win, but the contest boils down to two: incumbent president Goodluck Jonathan and former military ruler Muhammadu Buhari.

Security was the main issue in the lead-up to the poll, thanks to insurgency by Boko Haram, but various technical glitches affected the voting. Analysts are calling the poll a pivotal historical event for the young democracy. Jonathan’s People’s Democratic Party (PDP) has ruled Africa's most populous nation virtually unopposed for 16 years.

But it is possible he could lose to Buhari, who has contested three previous elections but never come close to victory before. Buhari’s opposition coalition, the All Progressives Congress (APC), has quickly gained popularity by presenting itself as the face of change for voters who have grown frustrated by the government’s record on corruption and its inability to defeat a dogged insurgency waged by the Boko Haram group. 

With the nation largely divided along ethnic and religious lines, a repeat of the violence which followed the 2011 results, which left 800 dead, had been feared. Thousands have fled the northern city of Kano in recent days to avoid the potential for similar disturbances. Expectant voters were left frustrated at many polling centres. Electronic biometric card readers – used for the first time in Nigeria – failed. President Jonathan’s registration was delayed after some failed attempts before being registered manually.

Most Nigerians expect a tight race. Insiders on both sides say that they are confident of victory, and a January poll by Afrobarometer put the parties neck and neck with 42 percent of the vote each.