The eyes of the nation and the world were fixated on Anambra State last Saturday as voters began to congregate in 4,623 polling stations to cast ballots for their preferred governorship candidates in an election considered very critical to Nigeria's democratic experiment. Anambra 2010 was seen as a litmus test or dress rehearsal for Nigeria 2011.

What the media dubbed an impending doomsday battle of political galacticos - on account of the pedigree of the presumptive frontrunners - turned out to be a very robust and exciting electioneering campaign that was mercifully devoid of violence.

Considering what they described as "the usual volatile nature of the place," media analysts rushed to stereotype Anambra as the nation's "political black sheep." In doing so, they conveniently glossed over the fact that despite the boisterous nature of its internal politics, the state has never witnessed the type of politically-motivated high-profile assassinations and mayhem prevalent in many parts of the nation. Unfortunately, the authorities in Abuja swallowed the media hype and virtually transformed Anambra into a police state, with a record number of 23,230 officers and men - complete with armored personnel carriers, bomb disposal vehicles and a surveillance helicopter - deployed to man the polling booths (roughly five cops per polling station)!

The result s of valid votes garnered by each of the six presumptive frontrunners, with the percentage of total valid votes cast in parenthesis, are as follows: Peter Obi of APGA - 97,843 (34.4); Chris Ngige of AC - 60,240 (21.2); Chukwuma Soludo of PDP - 59,355 (20.9); Andy Uba of LP - 26,106 (9.2); Nich Ukachukwu of HDP - 20,777 (7.3); and Uche Ekwunife of PPA - 9,559 (3.4). Truth be told, the overall outcome didn't come as a surprise to me. In discussions with Ikechukwu Amaechi, the award-winning daily editor of this newspaper, as well as with colleagues in the Anambra State Association of Town Unions (ASATU) - an umbrella organization of the Presidents-General of the 177 towns in the state - I consistently argued, backed up with statistics and defensible inferences, that if the poll was free and fair, it would be a straight contest between Obi and Ngige. Needless stating who I thought would be the top two contenders if the poll was rigged. I'm glad INEC did a commendable job and my forecast turned out to be right in the money.

But while the final outcome didn't come as a surprise to me, I must confess that I was fazed by Gov. Obi's winning margin of nearly 40,000 votes - a whopping 62.4% of the votes scored by the second-place winner! The voting pattern also revealed that the fractionalization and factionalization of the PDP in the state deeply hurt its chances of victory at the poll. It is a trite saying that "United we stand, and divided we fall." The only way the party could've realized its long-held ambition to 'capture' Anambra was by rallying behind a single candidate - be it Soludo or Uba. If PDP had remained united, it would've theoretically polled over 115,000 votes to edge out Peter Obi.

The other aspect that amazed me was Mrs. Ekwunife's underachievement. Given the great razzmatazz and media type over her candidacy great things were expected from her. She turned out to be the biggest flop, garnering less than 10,000 votes. The PDP renegades who wanted to use her candidature to make a defining political statement are now caught between a rock and a hard place. Since Politics Nigeriana is all about bread and butter, I fully expect them to swallow their pride and seek forgiveness like prodigal sons, only to be embroiled in their mutually assured destructive centripetal struggles for political power after a while. Whether the vengeance-seeking mandarins that rule Wadata Plaza would be so willing to turn the other cheek this time around is an entirely different matter.

I am one of the harshest critics of the Prof. Maurice Iwu-led Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) but there can be no gainsaying the fact that Anambra 2010 marked significant improvements in the conduct of elections in Nigeria. A few weeks to the election, INEC summarily sacked several top officials fingered in various voter registration scams - a marked difference from the past when the agency wallowed in self-denial, preferring to accuse opposition parties of crying wolf where there was none. For the first time ever, INEC inaugurated a nine-member Governorship Election Monitoring and Observation Board, comprising men and women of integrity, to demonstrate its resoluteness and commitment to a free and fair electoral process.

To ensure that none of its staff was compromised, the electoral agency went the extra mile of deploying brand new Resident Electoral Commissioner and 21 electoral officers to supervise the poll. Such confidence-building measures helped in no small way to convince most candidates, their parties and a large segment of the electorate that INEC meant serious business. The relative success of Anambra 2010 can also be largely ascribed to relentless efforts by several individuals, NGOs, civil society groups and religious bodies to empower Anambrarians through voter education and public enlightenment programs.

That is not to say that the election was flawless. Voting started well after noon in several locations because of late arrival of election materials and INEC field officers. But the delay wasn't entirely INEC's fault. There was a directive that no materials would leave the local government council headquarters without being accompanied by policemen to prevent any hanky-panky along the way. But not enough vehicles were on hand to transport the men and materials at the same time. Persistent flaws in the voters' register culminated in what election observers and monitors dubbed "the systemic and structural disenfranchisement of many voters." It was either they couldn't find their names in the register or that by the time they finally located a polling station where their names were found in the voters' register it was too late for them to vote. While addressing the candidates, party chairmen and stakeholders at the Tourist Garden Hotels in Awka three days to the election, Prof. Iwu assured them that anyone qualified to vote would be allowed, with either a permanent or temporary voter's card. Many field officers failed to obey this directive in the absence of a signed official statement.

I counsel those who opine that they were technically rigged out by the late commencement of voting in their strongholds to properly investigate the reasons why voting started as scheduled in other areas. The weakest link was the movement of men and materials from the local government council headquarters to the polling stations. How did the areas that recorded early voting solve this logjam and what lessons have those in areas that lagged behind learnt from the experience? It is fair to conclude that the identified hiccups notwithstanding, Anambra 2010 is 'Mission Accomplished.' Furthermore, its relative success signposts a much-improved general election in 2011. This ought to be a source of great comfort to the rest of Nigeria.