Electoral Strategies of People’s Democratic Party (PDP) and Election Credibility During the Nigeria’s 2011 Presidential Election in Kaduna

Nigeria’s 2011 presidential election was well run and rated credible by-election observers above 1999, 2003, and 2007 presidential elections but on the contrary, opposition Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) faulted the process and conduct of the election as fraudulent against the election observers’ claim consequently upon various electoral strategies used by the incumbent PDP. Hence, there is a need to investigate the electoral strategies of the incumbent PDP to settle the contending question of a certified credible election of the 2011 presidential election by the elec tion’s observers. Therefore, this paper will identify the electoral strategies of PDP during the 2011 presidential election. This qualitative study involved 23 adult informants comprising 20 males and 3 females within the age of 33-70 years. They were selected through a purposive sampling strategy and were interviewed accordingly. The findings discovered from the study include financial and economic strategies; demographic and geographical strategies; socio-political strategies, regime performance, and political/campaign promises, and multifaceted strategies. These strategies were used to secure victory for PDP at the national level. The novelty of the present study is the filling of the gap in previous studies on electoral strategies and the credibility of the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna. strategies; socio-political strategies, regime performance and political or campaign promises, and multifaceted strategies. These themes represent the core findings therefore, we have five findings that emerged from the study. These findings are the five core electoral strategies used by the PDP during the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna, Nigeria. Overall, there are 12 subthemes that emerged from the five themes. In view of these, the research question was favourably answered based on the findings that emerged from the study. Therefore, it could be asserted that the present research provides ready-made answers to the previous studies such as Osmah and Ikelegbe Lawal Olakunle et al. whose researches were not able to unveil the electoral strategies of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) used apart from rigging and manipulation they claimed. It was discovered too from the finding that the electoral strategies of PDP during the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna are both intended and unintended strategies and lastly, the PDP strategies in during the 2011 presidential election was the same as the strategies of party in other states in Nigeria during the period under study.

Therefore, Nigeria elections like all other African countries' elections continue to be an attractive scenario for international communities' and election observers' attention as election observers' reports were repeatedly poor due to incumbents' electoral strategies' influence on the elections. Consequently, the electorates lost any confidence in the elections and in most cases stay off voting on election day as they certainly know that their votes don't count in the selection of elective leaders. Ideally, in a democratic election under the ideal and good practice of democracy, Diamond (2004) admittedly states that, i) leaders of the people choose through free and fair elections; ii) freedom for all enfranchised persons to actively participate in choosing their leaders in both politics and civic life; iii) adequate protection of the human rights of all citizens and, iv) laws and procedures apply equally to all citizens. Similarly, Beetham (1998) also prescribed ideal principles of democracy to include where there are human rights and where rights and responsibilities are preserved, the existence of dignity of the individual person and the guaranteeing of right to a controlling influence over public decisions and decision-makers, and that they should be treated with equal respect and as of equal worth in the context of such decisions.
From these features, in principle, it then applies to all countries under a democratic practice to adhere and abide strictly by the democratic injunctions. It is on this standpoint that the researchers agreed that the electoral strategies of the incumbent People's Democratic Party (PDP) during Nigeria's fourth republic democratic elections in 1999, 2003, and particularly the 2007's presidential elections (Akubo & Yakubu, 2014) were not in congruence with the reality of elections under the ideal democratic principles as reveals by scholars and particularly by the Inter-Parliamentary Union. Because of its peculiar characteristics which were contrary to ideal keys of democracy in line with Diamond, 2004;and Beetham (1998). Based on the revelations from Tar & Zack-Williams (2007) as well as election observers such as EU EOM, 1999;Carter Centre, 2003;IRI, 2007, TMG, (2007 these Nigeria's presidential elections were characterized by irregularities such as overinflated vote returns, voters' disenfranchisement, ballot stuffing, and snatching, and clear manifestation of cases of result alteration, etc. specifically during the 2007 presidential election to mention but just a few. These are results and outcomes of abuses of procedural rules and regulations and manipulations contrary to global acceptable democratic electoral best practices. Consequentially, this resulted in protests and violence by supporters of opposition parties that led to the killings of several persons recorded in many states across the federation of Nigeria. Similarly, while virtually all the foreign and local election observers such as EU EOM, 1999;Carter Centre, 2003;IRI, 2007, TMG, 2007 agreed in their reports on the 2011 presidential election as the election that met the necessary minimum standard of electoral best practices and rated substantially credible, free and fair election as the conduct and process of the election followed the important steps that strengthen Nigeria's future democracy particularly that the election was characterized by peace and minimal violence (European Union Observation Mission, EU EOM, 2011).
However, the strongest opposition party, Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) claimed that the conduct and process of the election lacked the basic principles of a democratic election (as enumerated by Diamond, 2004;and Beetham (1998). The CPC disclosed that the incumbent People's Democratic Party (PDP) fraudulently employed different electoral strategies to rig the election to her favour and secured the victory in the presidential throne through overinflated vote returns, voters' disenfranchisement, ballot stuffing, and snatching, and clear manifestation of cases of result alteration, etc (Kofo, 2012). The CPC, therefore, called for the cancellation of the presidential election result and when the result was not canceled, the supporters of the CPC protested the election which eventually resulted in deadly post-election violence that erupted from Kaduna and claimed the lives of over 800 people within 72 two hours (Human Rights Watch, 2011). Based on the revelations, there exists a gap between the ideal democratic electoral principles and Nigeria 's 1999, 2003, and 2007 as discovered by the researcher's contrary to Diamond, 2004;Beetham (1998)'s ideal democratic principles as earlier enumerated.
These attributes of ideal democracy and democratic elections seem missing in the conduct and processes of the Nigeria presidential elections of 1999Nigeria presidential elections of , 2003Nigeria presidential elections of , and 2007 and even in the acclaimed credible election of the 2011 presidential election. Therefore, the research question answered by the present study is, 'what are the electoral strategies of People's Democratic Party (PDP) during the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna Nigeria in relation to credibility?' with the sole objective of the present study being to 'to examine the electoral strategies of People's Democratic Party (PDP) during the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna Nigeria'.

Literature Review
The section reveals the various academic and scholarly literature from previous studies that are not only related to the study but provides a benchmark of a standpoint for the present study. In this vein, the conceptual connections derived from the previous studies include electoral strategies of political parties and the gap left behind which informed the undertaking of the present study on electoral strategies of the People's Democratic Party (PDP) during the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna Nigeria. It is also argued by Daniel 2009;Raffles et al (2018) that the theory of the study of socio-political science has it that apart from the functions of recruitment of members as well as political socialization and political communication, political parties also perform the function arrangement of strategies to be adopted for winning other political parties in democratic elections.
In line with this, a study carried out in Indonesia by Waldi et al., (2018) on 'The strategy of political parties in winning legislative elections in Indonesia studies in Dharmasyara district' reveals that strategies adopted by parties (at least 15 political parties including 12 national parties and 3 local parties) in the district in question in order to win the election include political marketing where parties continuously paid attention not only to channeling all their campaign to the aspirations of the people through the political campaign on a long term basis (Firmnzah, 2007) but to purposely make the voters the subject of priority in parties ideologies so as for voters to build trust in the party that eventually transform to votes in the election (Waldi et al., 2018). Another is the creation of party awareness of the challenges of the voters so as to amend their ways and providing understanding between the party and the community of voters before the election. The last sets of strategies according to the study include: "To understand, master, and animate the political platform that their parties are fighting for. To also make party figures the political face for each of the socialization of their victory, to seriously form a network in the electoral area.
Candidates for the legislature must also make face-to-face visit meetings with the people in their constituencies about the territorial area and the situation, social, political, cultural, and economic conditions of the population in the environment" (Waldi et al 2018:22).
Results show that these strategies helped the parties in Indonesia to achieve voter turn-out as it was explained that in general the percentage of community voting rights in the legislative, presidential, and vice-presidential elections reached 73.  (2018), also in a study pointed out that the 'responsible party model' of political representation did holds that political parties need to represent the policy of their supporters as this is normatively desirable most particularly where citizens in a democracy are represented by and through political parties. Therefore, political parties are under obligation to provide programme or policy options to enable voters to have meaningful electoral options and choices. However, evidence is available according to Hans (2018) that the strategy could only be effective when competition existing between parties are within a unidimensional policy space otherwise it will have a negative electoral effect. Hans argues that representing and maintaining voter/supporter policy could only be achieved in western consolidated democracy particularly in Western Europe.
Based on this position, Han (2018:2) succinctly disclosed that if position blurring is a useful strategy, for political parties then parties may or may not likely blur the policy position they take but the parties do this strategy if voter polarization on a particular issue provides the party incentives to present blurred or clear positions on the issue in question. Hans further stressed that the choice of party to either take a position on either blurred or clear position is usually determined by the priority of the party. Hans concludes that the data on party position and public opinion in Europe they use shows that if voters are polarized political parties present clearer positions on issues and concentrate on to primarily mobilize on and then fewer clear positions on other available issues that are secondary. Evidently, as Han (2018) admits from the findings that are in the literature of comparative politics, position blurring is harmful in a two-party system that competes in single-issue dimension for example in the United States of America unlike in multiparty states like as in Western Europe where competition is two or more dimensions. As pointed out earlier under the introduction to this study, several scholarly works have been carried out in Asia and Africa in particular and these studies exposed the electoral strategies of incumbent political parties. The studies are the ones conducted in Asia countries particularly in Vietnam, North Korea, Laos, and China by Watson and Gadaingan (2016) while other studies include that of Lokniti (2015); Prasad (2013); Ordikar (2016); Abedni (2020); Azad and Haidari (2016); Nils and Michael (2013) carried on India, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan. The products of these electoral strategies of incumbents' parties and or leaders in these countries were lack of credible election, crisis, violence, and ethnic rivalries.
Similarly, scholars like Adejumobi (2000) also disclosed that in African countries such as Zambia, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, Sudan, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Mauritius, Kenya, Gambia, Benin Republic, Botswana, Angola, and many more experienced severe democratic retreat due to different sizes and shades of incumbent electoral strategies which resulted to outright and flagrant violation of the principles of democracy in relation to electoral processes and conducts and such elections produced negative consequences of a free and fair and credible election. It was also disclosed by scores of scholars like Adejumobi (2007); Alumona (2007); Suberu (2007); Onu and Momoh (2005); Anifowose and Babawale (2003) to mention but just a few that the incumbent political parties over the years have truncated Nigeria's democracy through their electoral strategies and have had a serious setback on conducting a credible, free and fair election. Consequently, produced elections that lacked credibility, free and fairness of electoral procedural rules and resulted in cases of staying off voting, protest, and violence as elections lacked merits in terms of democratic principles. Elections results were also manipulated at a higher frequency based on apparent violation of electoral processes against the internationally acceptable electoral best practices. In fact, even where election observers made observations, incumbents disregard implementing the observations in subsequent elections. These were the scenario of Nigeria's elections from independence up to the first three general elections of 1999, 2003, and 2007.
In Nigeria's 2011 presidential election unlike the 1999, 2003, and 2007 presidential elections, results of the official report of election observers such as EU EOM, 2011, IRI, 2011Carter Centre, 2011, andBekoe (2011) portrayed that the influence of electoral strategies of the incumbent People's Democratic Party (PDP) during the election was insignificant hence the observers' reports show a significant improvement in the process, conduct, and management of the election and proved that the election met the international conditions for global electoral best practices and as a result, the elections were substantially credible. Though the election was rated as credible due to lack of evidential proof of the substantial influence of electoral strategies of the incumbent People's Democratic Party influence on the election, the opposition party, Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) disagreed with the election observers report and in a protest (Kofo, 2012) declared that the 2011 presidential election like any other fourth republic presidential election was characterized by PDP electoral strategies and manipulations hence, the party rejected the result declaration of the PDP Presidential Candidate as the winner of the 2011 Presidential election by Nigeria's electoral umpire, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). Consequently, the rejection of the election result by the opposition CPC resulted in the highest level of post-electoral violence and violence in Nigeria's democratic electoral history which left over 800 people dead and various valuable properties destroyed as a result of an election that was rated credible by renowned election observers such as European Union Election Observation Mission, International Republic Institute, ECOWAS Monitoring Group, Carter Centre, and many more.
While reviewed studies across the world, in Asia, Africa, and previous elections in Nigeria before the 2011 presidential election were said to be manipulated through incumbent parties electoral strategies and consequent lack of credibility producing intended and unintended consequences of protest, crisis, violence, and war, the same cannot be said of 2011 presidential election because the election was certified free and fair by certified and globally acceptable and acclaimed election observers. Equally worth mentioning and celebrated about the 2011 presidential election in Nigeria was that the election was insignificantly influenced by minor electoral strategies of PDP as testified by-election observers such as the European Union Election Observation Mission, International Republican Institute, and others (EU EOM, 2011, IRI, 2011. The accusation by the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) with regard to electoral strategies used by PDP to manipulate the election to her victory during the 2011 presidential election is unique. This is because the election was conducted and the process was proved to have met conditions for global electoral best practices made as testified by election observers. Therefore, Nigeria's 2011 presidential election was unique and different from other global and previous Nigeria's presidential elections because a certified credible is not supposed to be contestable hence, it becomes a case worthy of study. As a result, the present study is worthy of study in relation to the electoral strategies of the incumbent PDP so as to understand why an election that was rated credible still produced the highest level of disagreement in Nigeria and led to the deaths of over 800 people. The present study becomes paramount due to the scanty study of in-depth research on electoral strategies of PDP and credibility of the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna Nigeria by previous scholars particularly Olawale (2007) The reviews of previous literature showed that studies relating to electoral strategies of political parties left a gap behind that supports the undertaking of the present study on electoral strategies of the People's Democratic Party (PDP) during the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna Nigeria. Scholars such as Waldi et al (2018) using his study in Indonesia supported this study that there are functions of arrangement of strategies adopted by political parties for winning other political parties in democratic elections such as long-term political marketing which usually transform into electoral votes for parties on election day. Han (2018) on the other hand submits from his study that policy supported by party supporters remains the normative and desirable strategies parties pursue in a democracy therefore, parties are under obligation to provide program or policy options to enable voters to have those meaningful electoral options and choices. However, Han humbly submits that effective when competition existing between parties are within a unidimensional policy which is easily realizable in western consolidated democracies particularly in Western Europe. From Asia and Africa based on studies that have been carried out exposed the electoral strategies of incumbent political parties. The studies in Asia were conducted by Watson and Gadaingan (2016); Lokniti (2015); Prasad (2013), Ordikar (2016); Akran and Das (2006); Abedni (2020); Azad and Haidari (2016); Nils and Michael (2013) showed that electoral strategies of incumbent's parties and or leaders in these countries produces lack of credible election which consequentially breeds war, crisis, violence, and ethnic rivalries. Similarly, In Africa, Adejumobi (2000) in his study using scores of African countries disclosed that electoral strategies of incumbents' breeds' severe democratic retreat due to different sizes and shades of outright and flagrant violation of the principles of democracy in relation to electoral processes and conducts. Therefore, these elections under the African leaders' incumbents produced negative consequences of a free and fair, and credible election. It was also disclosed by scores of scholars like Adejumobi (2007)

Research Methodology
The study design for the present study adopts by the researchers in qualitative research. There are reasons for adopting qualitative research design for the present study, electoral strategies of People's Democratic Party (PDP) during the 201 presidential elections in Kaduna. The motives are centered on the fact that it is established on logical and scientific truth that the design is rich and deeper in the understanding of a phenomenon. It also gives insights to researchers to as well understand the reasons for the occurrence of behaviours of informants and help informants to freely express themselves. Purposive sampling (a non-probability sampling technique) was adopted for the study as it is usually very suitable and useful for qualitative studies. Secondly, it helps in the identification and selection of relevant informants who are both considered experienced, knowledgeable, and willing to fully participate in the study and provides relevant information that led the researchers to achieve the objective of the research. Key informants for the study were drawn from among the staff of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), top members of staff of the People's Democratic Party (PDP), and the former members of the defunct Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), Traditional rulers of the specific study areas, religious leaders of both Christianity and Islamic religions, civil society activists, non-governmental organization staff and lastly, the academia.
In all, twenty-three (23) informants within the age bracket of 32 to 70 were used for the study as they were all knowledgeable and experienced in the phenomenon under study. The gender of the informants used for the study includes 3 females and 20 males towards ensuring gender representativeness in the study. The data was collected from the selected informants through an in-depth face-to-face interview conducted with the informants at the respective chosen places of their interest. Phase one commenced on 18th December 2017 and ended on 19th March 2018 while the second phase took off on the 2nd July 2019 and ended on 14th September 2019. The interview was conducted using the set of semi-structured questions contained in the interview guide.
Thematic analysis format is the basic tool of analysis used for the present study adopted using the six stages as enunciated by Merriam (2014); Creswell (2013). The organization of the data includes the manual transcription of the recorded data using Microsoft word, sorting of data which consequently resulted in the emergence of six themes which are financial and economic strategies; demographic and geographical Strategies; Socio-political strategies, Regime's Performance, and political/campaign promises, and lastly, the multifaceted strategies. Others stages include coding of data that brought descriptive themes and subsequent code labels and it equally results in reporting in rich narrative forms. Another phase is the descriptive presentation of views of the informants achieved through comparing field data to established views and data in the reviewed literature relating to the study. This exercise empowered the researchers to establish the gap created by the present study. The sixth and last stage of data analysis is the validation of finding. This stage is called the proof of the accuracy of the findings of the present research. The validation includes triangulation validation done through sources of data collection using primary and secondary sources, triangulation in data collection instruments documentary, and qualitative in-depth interview.
Other evidence of validation of finding includes the peer examination, member checking, and adequate involvement in data collection by the researchers, thick description of findings through direct quotations from the views and opinions of informants as well as validation of transcribed data by informants after the interview through a hardcopy of transcribed data submitted to them after interviews. Therefore, consequent upon these validation instruments, the present research is valid and reliable.

Findings
The findings of the data analysis obtained from the 23 informants of the study produced five themes which include financial and economic strategies; demographic and geographical strategies; socio-political strategies, regime performance and political or campaign promises, and multifaceted strategies. These themes represent the core findings therefore, we have five findings that emerged from the study. These findings are the five core electoral strategies used by the PDP during the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna, Nigeria. Overall, there are 12 subthemes that emerged from the five themes. In view of these, the research question was favourably answered based on the findings that emerged from the study. Therefore, it could be asserted that the present research provides ready-made answers to the previous studies such as Osmah and Ikelegbe (2009)

Financial and Economic Strategies
Financial and economic strategies is one of the core strategies used by the incumbent People's Democratic Party (PDP) during the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna Nigeria. The strategies were seen by the informants as a very strong weapon that enhanced the victory of the incumbent PDP during the election under study. The views, comments and reporting of the exact things seen and witnessed by the informants are hereby presented. The respondents vividly described the use of money on the electorates by the incumbent PDP during the 2011 presidential election thus: …in our election work, there are people you have to drop a car of N20M for them. These are the wholesale election fathers that you know. All these are not in the electoral law but the laws outside the electoral laws are stronger and more potent than the electoral laws. If you don't honour all these nonelectoral laws, you cannot go anywhere in politics. These unwritten electoral laws are the major determinant of election and you need money to do all these. So, all these are the strategies PDP used (Informant 7) Similarly, a member of the opposition party admits that: The PDP used money very well in the 2011 presidential election because they have the money as an incumbency party. If the PDP did not give people money, they will give them clothes of assorted types where they distribute it to the people (Informant 2).
Non-party affiliate informants disclosed that: The PDP had money, they had the fund and they had the representatives and these representatives contributed to the party so they had money at their disposal to dish out to the electorates. Again, a night to the election I also knew that PDP used money. In the location where I lived during that 2011 election, PDP members were going from one house to house sharing money with people in other to lure them into voting for them. Money was shared, foodstuffs were shared, and other things. These were some of the strategies that PDP used to gain support from the electorates (Informant 5).
Demonstrating that PDP used money and material items on the electorate even on election day to influence their vote in the party's favour, an informant said: During the time of the campaign, PDP came out with enough money and they shared it with people. They also shared foods, such as staple foods, rice which they bagged in small rice bags. They used to target people to see that it is at the time that people needed assistance that they did share for them the items. Even on the day of the election, right on the line, they will go to the women to give money (Informant 14).
Another informant revealed the strategy used in sharing of which is mostly in the night. The informant declared as follow: During the time of the campaign, PDP came out with enough money and they shared it with people. They also shared foods, such as staple foods, rice which they bagged in small rice bags. They used to target people to see that it is at the time that people needed assistance that they did share for them the items. Even on the day of the election, right on the line, they will go to the women to give money (Informant 15).
One member of the ruling PDP also revealed the use of money by the party saying: Like if we enter some area, if we see that the people in that area are old people, we cannot use a grinding machine or something like this, then we share money with them. But strong people, we do not give them money but only to show them how they can use something like this and buy those things for them but other people that are unable to do anything, we can use money give them or we carry rice share for them, a bag of rice and soap share for them (Informant 13).
An Informant also revealed that money was given to various youth organizations to silence them. The informant disclosed this in the following sentences: Ok, One, I told you they went to the youth organization, women organization and traditional rulers then they used these types of organs to spend money for them and give them. The main reason for convincing them is that they knew that if they announce that PDP won with having this type of organization so now there is going to be a problem so they went and give money to all these organizations. So even if they rigged the election and they won, people will just keep quiet because of those organizations (Informant 20) A revelation was also made by many of the informants regarding vote-buying by the ruling PDP during the 2011 presidential election. He asserts that:

Appointment of a Credible and Principal INEC (Independent National Electoral Commission) Chairman.
Professor Attahiru Jega based on the view, opinions, and comments of the returned glory to INEC and for the first time in 10 years Nigeria electorates reposed confidence on INEC to be able to conduct a credible, transparent and clean election where the votes of the electorate will count. So, the appointment of Jega led to increasing political participation of the enfranchised Nigerians and earned PDP victory at the poll.
You know that as of 2011, Professor Attahiru Jega has been already the Chairman of INEC. And when Jega came in, everybody knows him as a man of integrity (Informant 1) Intensive Campaign by PDP An intensive campaign by PDP is one of the discoveries from the study that proved a strong reason for PDP's triumph nationally during the 2011 presidential election. Both opposition informants and incumbents' party informants and others strongly acknowledged that PDP indeed really campaigned more than other political parties in that 2011 presidential elections.
The major contributors to this opinion are informant 15, 16, and 21 in the following words:

House-to-house campaign was intensive and widespread across Kaduna:
Aaah 2011, one thing I would like to say is our way of campaigning. As of 2011, we struggle to win the election through the intensive campaign. We made and move from house-house and door-door campaign. And our campus deals with awareness (Informant 15)

The campaign was done by PDP vigorously not minding their incumbency position:
During the campaign period, PDP campaigned so much that as if they are not the party in power ruling the country. They came up all out so that no matter how you think, they will take you to the side. Are they not the one ruling, why are they so eager out for the campaign? People expect the ruling party to relax or even set up the machinery to rig the election. They came out in numbers; they came out in numbers above the expectation (Informant 16).

Use of Political Propaganda by Supporters of the Incumbent PDP
Another finding from the study is the use of political propaganda by supporters of the incumbent PDP in 2011 to instill fear in the opposition parties that election results in favour of opposition parties shall be denied and votes be counted as PDP votes. This by implication is a strategy to weaken the oppositions. The number one strategy is propaganda. They used much propaganda and instilled fear in the minds of the people as such most of the people believed that the CPC would win the election but it will not be announced. That was the PDP supporters telling the CPC supporters that you are just wasting your time because you will win the election but you will not be given (Informant 12)

Secret Recruitment of Card Carriers of PDP as INEC Ad-hoc Staff during the 2011 presidential election
There was a Secret Recruitment of Card Carriers of PDP as INEC Ad-hoc Staff during the 2011 presidential election. This revelation emerged from the findings of the study as obtained from the informants. The opinion was put as thus: We saw PDP political parties during the 2011 presidential election who make sure that the umpire which is the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has room for them to bring in candidates who were ad-hoc staff and with that we're able to manipulate the election. Most of the ad-hoc staff used during those elections were strictly card-carrying members and some were people who were working closely than with the ruling party. So, this one of the strategies then the ruling political party used in overcoming the other political parties as regards the elections in 2011.
The informant further stressed that the secret recruitment the incumbent did greatly help the ruling party to manipulate the outcome of the election. There are others, but because of the eye, which is very, very strange and very cunning. Politicians are very cunning in the sense that they deal with methods that have to deal with where they see that they do not have strong-hold, this ad-hoc staff that I mentioned, they connive with supervisors who are supposed to be suppliers of electoral materials, ballot papers inclusive, they strategized to deploy fewer materials in where they do not have a stronghold. And where they have a stronghold, they supplied these materials in abundance. So, these are some of the strategies that we observers see, observed, and noticed that could help the ruling political parties in dominating the other political parties:

Regime's Performance and political/Campaign promise
The fourth findings from the research concern the strategies of PDP is related to the performances of PDP from 1999-2011. Informants say that the PDP: In view of all these, an informant sums up as he revealed that: All together, they used all those one to speak to us or under these campaign promises that they will do this and that… (Informant 9) Finally, it was testified by informants that: One of the major factors that worked for the PDP then was the even distribution of development (Informant 23).

Multifaceted Strategy
The fifth and final strategy used by PDP during the 2011 presidential election is the multifaceted strategy. Informant describes the multifaceted strategy as a no strategy because: One other phase of the multifaceted strategies adopted by PDP during the 2011 presidential election as revealed by informants is the adoption of presidential candidate of PDP from among the minority ethnic group for the first time since Nigeria. One of the informants said: Adopting Goodluck Jonathan for PDP Presidential ticket in 2011 earned the Party the national victory because he is a civilian without a military background as against General Muhammadu Buhari. The factor that worked is that you know, the Northern region in the Nigerian political landscape has produced presidents more than any side of the nation. The South-South geopolitical zone has the opportunity of producing one of them. Look at the aspiration of Nigeria who was just coming out of military rule in 1999. And the major opposition political party then was a retired military General so this factor counted against Buhari very well. So, at that time, the nation needed a pure civilian in the position of the president in the present dispensation at that time.
Overall, the findings established by the study presented by our informants shows the strategies of the People's Democratic Party (PDP) during the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna Nigeria to include the use of money and vote-buying, the use of economic and material resources to lure voters to vote for PDP during the 2011 election, the national outlook as well as the geographical and widespread of PDP all over every nook and cranny of Nigeria. One other important strategy adopted by PDP is social-political strategies. In these social and political strategies, the informants disclosed that the PDP extensively uses social media as well as printing, and electronic media for the campaign. Also, the PDP use zoning strategy by zoning all the top-ranking positions within the PDP to the six geopolitical zones of the country to promote equity and fairness, similarly, PDP equitably shared and distributed power and governance portfolios to all people including even the minorities who since political independence has been alienated from governance, the informants also revealed that PDP created new traditional kingdoms and chiefdoms and equally upgraded some traditional rulers to first-class chiefs. Still, on the socio-political strategies, there was a revelation that came from the informants that the PDP enjoyed incumbency advantages over other political parties, evidence from the findings also disclosed that the PDP adopted the strategy of appointing a new electoral management board chairman in 2010 and he conducted credible elections that Nigerians were given the opportunity for their votes to count. The other strategies under the socio-political strategies of PDP identified by informants based on the findings are political propaganda, the use of a very popular candidate as contestants in all elections, and lastly, there was secret recruitment of PDP card carriers into the INEC as ad-hoc staff. Besides, evidence proved beyond a reasonable doubt from the study that PDP performed very well in terms of infrastructure, employment, poverty alleviation, and boosting of agriculture particularly in subsidizing fertilizers for farmers, and also improvement in education. These strategies paid off for PDP's victory in the 2011 presidential election. Lastly, the strategy used by PDP during the 2011 presidential election as reported by the informants is a multifaceted strategy. In this strategy, PDP has different plans and the party switched from one plan to the other through a decisive plan and this strategy helped the party not only to win the 2011 presidential but other elections as well.

Discussion
The findings in the present study on the electoral strategies of the incumbent People's Democratic Party (PDP) was in tandem with previous studies such as Osmah and Ikelegbe (2009); Lawal (2015); Olakunle et al (2019) which discovered that the People's Democratic Party (PDP) used different strategies which include rigging and manipulation of the election. However, it was as a result of the shortcomings of these studies to identify what is rigging and manipulation of the election served as one of the prompting factors for conducting this study.
The findings of this present study have indeed, created a wide margin between the enumerated studies and the present one, particularly when compared the findings of the strategies used by the PDP during the 2011 presidential election as revealed by this study with the previous ones. Given the first finding of the present study on money politics and votebuying by the incumbent PDP during the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna, Nigeria, previous research conducted by Ovwasa (2013) is akin to the present study. Ovwasa's study found out that vote-buying and money politics in Nigeria is sustainable and, on the rise, because politicians in Nigeria have discovered that there is a shortage of party manifesto and ideology to convince the electorates and to transform to votes than money, hence politics became a market of readily available money exchange venue where the highest bidder gets votes from the electorates. The study of U.S 'money and politics' by Be-Viert (1985) also discovered that there was an influence of money in California politics. The shortfall in Ovwasa's and BeViert's studies' is their inability to study the role of money politics and vote buying through qualitative in-depth study as established by the finding in the first theme of this study.
The second finding on the geographical and demographic strategy which served as a strong strategy of PDP that assisted the PDP to win the presidential ticket in 2011 in Nigeria is supported by Hyland (1995) (2016), propaganda is still a way of securing a victory in an election. Therefore, the findings by the present study are in line with other previous scholarly research conducted in different countries across the world.

Conclusion
The present study which examined the electoral strategies of the incumbent People's Democratic Party (PDP) during the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna Nigeria revealed striking strategies of the party. The findings present and represent unique discoveries of PDP electoral strategies during the 2011 presidential election that were missing from the findings of previous related studies on the electoral strategies of the PDP in Nigeria's electoral spectrum. In fact, the discovery of the striking strategies of PDP achieved and recorded by the present study was a result of the adoption of qualitative in-depth study and purposive sampling technique which made possible the selection of 23 creams of informants drawn by the researchers from the 2011 presidential election stakeholders. These informants were drawn from different affiliations, divergent educational backgrounds, and cream of electoral and democratic experiences and from various life careers which helped the study to have obtained rich information. Coupled with these enumerated factors that made the success of the research possible is the combination of qualitative in-depth interviews and document review as instruments of data collection.
The finding and discussion of the study are related to the problem statement which is to study the electoral strategies of the People's Democratic Party (PDP) and the credibility of the 2011 presidential election in Kaduna, Nigeria. The findings revealed the various electoral strategies of PDP during the 2011 presidential election particularly the vote-buying, sharing of money and other materials, food items, textile materials motorcycles, cars, grinding machines, and many other things to electorates before, and during the election has consequential effects on the credibility of the 2011 presidential election. These are a rejection of election results by opposition Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), post-electoral protest by the supporters of opposition CPC, post-electoral violence, and spill-over effect of the election to eleven other states in the Northern region apart from Kaduna. Finally, there was wanton destruction of properties worth several hundreds of millions, death of over 800 people who were killed, and wanton destruction of properties as a result of the post-electoral violence as reported by Human rights in April 2011. There were reprisal attacks and killings of Nigerians in other parts of the country, Nigeria. In fact, overall, the consequences of the 2011 post-presidential election violence and killing of people across the 12 Northern states of Adamawa, Bauchi, Borno, Gombe, Jigawa, Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Niger, Sokoto, Yobe, and Zamfara State. Despite this, the present study helps in understanding the electoral strategies of incumbent political parties particularly the PDP. It could as well be helpful to political and democratic policymakers to be able to formulate and execute policies towards checking some electoral strategies of incumbents such as vote-buying, sharing of money, and several kinds of items to prospective voters that are not only inimical to politics but to the democratic election in particular and democracy in general.
The shortcoming of the present in-depth research, however, was its conduct in only the two Kaduna city local governments of North and South and specifically in Kaballa Costain, Kaballa Doki and Barnawa and Ungwuwar Muazu with just a few informants of twenty-three. Therefore, the established findings that emerged from this study should further be carried out using a larger population through a quantitative study. Despite these shortcomings, the present study on electoral strategies of the incumbent People's Democratic Party (PDP) during the 2011 presidential election is a novelty in democratic electoral studies as its findings filled a gap and vacuum created by studies of scores of scholars from different countries as reviewed.