Prof. Yusufu Obaje, former Aso Villa Chaplain, said yesterday that the Supreme Court judgment on 2007 Presidential Election on Friday called for sober reflection by Nigerians and God's mercy.

Obaje told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja that the verdict was "neither a victory for President Umaru Yar'adua nor defeat for the presidential candidates of the ANPP and AC".

General Muhammadu Buhari, the ANPP presidential candidate and former Vice President Atiku Abubakar had gone to the Supreme Court to challenge the affirmation of Yar'adua's victory by the Court of Appeal.

"To me, this judgment is neither a victory for President Yar'adua nor defeat for Buhari and Atiku.

"I think it calls for more prayers that this present administration should give Nigerians the opportunity to believe that it has a capacity to turn victory into success", Obaje said.

"So far, from what we have seen, we have no cause to rejoice at all. As a matter of fact, we should all go back on our kneels, both Christians and Muslims and pray for God's mercy on this nation.

"Because, the tragedy of this nation is the level of poverty rava-ging the country that God had so much blessed and this is unaccep-table. This is not just the responsibility of our leaders alone, it in-volves all of us", Obaje, former governorship candidate of the De-mocratic Peoples Party (DPP) in Kogi said.

According to him, the level of political illiteracy in Africa is a major hindrance to its holistic development.

"Any serious administration must address this issue of political illiteracy. As long as this is prevalent in our society, we cannot have free and fair election in Nigeria. I commend the Supreme Court Justices, at least, we have seen the two types of their judgments, that is prog-ress and one day, we shall make it", he said.

Commenting on the call for removal of immunity clause as a way of fighting corruption, Obaje said the anti-graft effort had nothing to do with the immunity clause.

He said: "If the judiciary and other anti-corruption agencies are serious enough, I think we can deal with the problem of corruption without the removal of immunity clause.

"Corruption is a serious matter. We cannot handle it the way we are doing now and once that continues, there is no way we can wipe out corruption until we develop a political system or type of democracy that is in touch with our own purview.

"We can never have a borrowed democracy and expect it to work and once there is that political failure, corruption would strive".

On Ghana's electoral system, Obaje said Nigerians do not need to look after a foreign system.

"We should come back and fashion out solutions to our political problems", he said.