ANALYSIS: Nextier Poll shows all is still at play ahead of 2023 for Obi, Atiku, Tinubu and Kwankwaso - Abdul Mahmud

In response to a recently published Nextier Poll, which shows the presidential candidate of the Labor Party for Nigeria's 2023 elections, Mr. Peter Obi, in a clear ahead of his opponents in the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), major Opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), and the New Nigeria People's Party (NNPP), top lawyer and political analyst, Abdul Mahmud, has given an analysis of what the results of the poll means for each of the top four candidates in the presidential election. 

This is what he has to say:

If I were in the Briefing Rooms/War Rooms of any of the presidential candidates, I'll be looking at:

1. The 2.2% margin of error at 95% CI, which establishes the fact that all is still at play - as the factors/variables/determinants of victory are still unknown;

2. The distributable margins of victory between PO, AA and BAT are still too close at 13.3% - between the first and second leader-candidates;

3. That for any candidate to secure victory at first ballot, he must average 62.5% in at least 4 geopolitical regions.

For AA, all he needs is to yo (sic) push up his margins in NE/NW and increase his margins share in SS/NC or SW. 19.8% of undecided voters is huge. 

For Obi, he has to increase his margin share in the SS or maintains (sic) what the poll says he commands; increase his share in NC to 62.5% and expand his margin in the SW, with 19.8% voters still undecided in that region. To win the election at first ballot, he has to stay competitive in at least in (sic) one of two regions: NE/SW. 

For BAT, he has the most difficult path to the presidency - on the basis of Nextier polls. He has to increase his margins in the SW/SS/NW/NE. 

13.3% is a slim margin in any consequential election. Obi has some work to do in the NC to push up his margin counts to at least 67%. There are huge votes in the NC. He has to find out how that region backed GEJ in 2011 and why it stayed away in 2015, thus inflicting huge damage on GEJ's votes count that year. Only eggheads in the war room with their eyes in the right places will decipher the how and why. 

2023 heads to the cliff hanger. 

Abdul Mahmud is a top Nigerian lawyer and senior counsel at his law firm, Ephesis Lex. This article was originally published by him via his Twitter page in reaction to the Nextier Poll.