Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila has declared Nigeria’s 2023 elections the most competitive since the return of democracy in 1999.

The Lagos lawmaker rated the general polls on Tuesday in Abuja at an induction organised for Senators-elect and Reps-elect.

He noted that in the national exercise, “assumptions about electoral performance based on historical antecedents proved nought”.

Gbajabiamila recalled how top political parties and interests were dislodged in places where such were impossible for two decades.

“Persons who had never aspired to political office or whose previous aspirations had failed, succeeded this time,” he observed.

Noting that national politics have been rewritten, the Speaker said the people are in a new age of Nigerian democracy.

Gbajabiamila of the All Progressives Congress (APC) commended the electorate for waking up to the enormous power of their votes.

The 2023 election, according to him, ended the days when membership of a particular party meant an “automatic guarantee of reelection”.

Gbaja, however, advised leaders to accelerate democratic dividends or risk “the total loss of legitimacy that can only lead to bad outcomes”.