Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Professor Mahmood Yakubu, is a besieged man. His consistent assurance of a free, fair and transparent election next month has been dismissed by opposition figures, particularly the erstwhile ruling party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), as empty promises. Senior Deputy Editor, TAIWO AMODU, examines the issues that have pitched the INEC against the opposition parties.
LESS than two months to the conduct of the general election, the activities of the electoral umpire, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) have come under sustained criticisms of certain stakeholders in the electoral process. If there is any agency of the Federal Government whose operations have courted the anger of agitated Nigerians in recent times, it is the electoral body.
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In the last two weeks, it has updated anxious electorate and political parties on the volume of Permanent Voters Cards (PVCs) for the election, justified its insistence to use manual collation of results from polling units as against electronic transmission and unveiled its Commissioners that would be assigned to supervise certain sensitive operations in the next month election.
Chairman of INEC, Professor Mahmood Yakubu, had penultimate Thursday, announced a 12-member Adhoc Committee on Collation Centre for the presidential election, with one of his National Commissioners, Amina Bala Zakari, as chairman.
According to Professor Yakubu, the committee “shall be responsible for the national collation centre from where results of the presidential election will be announced.”
As soon as the announcement hit the airwaves, the opposition parties, particularly the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) kicked against it, rejecting the choice of Amina Zakari amongst the pool of Commissioners in INEC for the sensitive operation.
Director, Media & Publicity, PDP Presidential Campaign Organisation, Kola Ologbondiyan, in a statement demanded for the removal of “Mrs. Amina Zakari, a niece of President Muhammadu Buhari, as the chairperson of INEC Advisory Committee and Presidential Election Collation Centre Committee.”
The main opposition party further submitted that “the appointment of Mrs. Amina Zakari constitutes a direct violence against the presidential election and the PDP will not, in any way, whatsoever, accept it.”
The statement read in part: “The Peoples Democratic Party Presidential Campaign Organisation vehemently and unequivocally rejects, in its entirety, the appointment of Mrs. Amina Zakari, President Buhari’s blood relation, as head of the collation of results in the same election in which her uncle, President Buhari, is a candidate.
“The appointment of Mrs. Amina Zakari constitutes a direct violence against the presidential election and the PDP will not, in any way, whatsoever, accept it. This is the same Amina Zakari who headed the ICT Department of INEC. It will interest Nigerians to note that this is the same Amina Zakari that was alleged to have played some roles in the 2018 governorship election in Osun state.
“In appointing Mrs. Amina Zakari to head the collation of this Presidential election, Professor Yakubu has confirmed that he has been compromised. We, therefore, call on all Nigerians and particularly the National Peace Committee to note that with the appointment of Amina Zakari as head of the collation of presidential results, the INEC chairman is setting the stage for a very huge political crisis, which is capable of derailing our democratic process.
“We also urge the United Nations and other global democratic institutions to take note of this appointment by the INEC Chairman. The PDP remains committed to a peaceful and credible process, but we will never, in any way, allow anybody to use any means, under any guise whatsoever, to rig us out in this election — not after it is clear that Nigerians have attained a consensus to rally behind our presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, as their next president.
“All we ask for is a free, fair, credible and transparent electoral process in which the votes of Nigerians will not only count but will be seen to have counted.”
The Yoruba sociocultural group, Afenifere, among other eminent bodies equally asked INEC to seek for replacement for Amina Zakari.
In a telephone interview with Sunday Tribune, spokesperson of Afenifere, Yinka Odumakin, actually called for the resignation of Amina Zakari from INEC, based on her relationship with President Buhari, a candidate in the process she has been assigned as head of supervision of the collation centre.
He said: “She has to go. INEC can’t recuse her of responsibilities as long as she is still on the Commission. Our demand is direct to President Buhari. The statement that the Presidency issued they said that she isn’t the president’s blood relation but she is related to him one way or the other through intermarriage.
“That’s one thing. Secondly, this woman was nominated by Nasir el-Rufai to INEC. She served with el-Rufai when he was a Minister; it was El Rufai that nominated her and I want him to deny that. I can see that in all the elections where she has been accused to have played one role or the other, el-Rufai is always defending her! So, she is a red flag for 2019. She must be relieved of that post. Her brother can give her an appointment in the Presidency, but not to conduct elections for us. She is tainted and therefore she must go.”
Checks by Sunday Tribune revealed that in July 2015, Amina Zakari was appointed acting national chairman of INEC by President Muhammadu Buhari, following the expiration of tenure of Professor Attahiru Jega as chairman. Before the emergence of Professor Yakubu, the PDP kicked consistently against her appointment as the party insisted that a niece to the incumbent president would not be impartial in the discharge of her functions.
The INEC chairman in his defence of the commission’s choice of Mrs Zakari told newsmen that her duty was only to coordinate activities at the International Conference Centre, Abuja, which has been chosen as venue for the announcement of results of presidential elections. Professor Yakubu further noted that it was his statutory responsibility to formally take charge of collation and announce the results collated from across the federation.
A source in INEC who pleaded not to be named, however, told Sunday Tribune that the commission could have saved itself from unwarranted embarrassment and vilification by allowing Professor Okechukwu Ibeano, the Commissioner in charge of Logistics and Operations to superintend as head of collation.
Ikenga Ugochinyere, spokesman of the Inter-Party Advisory Council (IPAC) aligned with the observation of the INEC staff, as he declared that Ibeano should have been given the responsibility assigned to Mrs Zakari.
He said: “He (Professor Yakubu) has refused all attempts to hold meetings with us to discuss the guidelines up till this moment that he brought this doctored documents to rig the 2019 general election. We also want to discuss his position on Amina Zakari as the chairman of the election collation committee knowing her antecedents. Her job is welfare and health while the issue of collation operation falls under Ibeano who is the commissioner in charge of operations.”
Double speak on amended electoral Act
Stakeholders anxious to see the commission walk its talk on its pledge to ensure that results of next month elections are transmitted electronically were confounded when President Buhari, last December, withdrew his assent on the 2018 Electoral Act Amendment Bill. With the development, the commission was handicapped since there is no statute to back its innovation.
Addressing newsmen on Tuesday at its annual consultative meeting with journalists, the Commissioner in charge of Logistics and Operations, Okechukwu Ibeano, said INEC had no choice but to revert to manual collation of results.
He said: “INEC cannot administratively implement transmission of results. Why INEC will like to do so, we have been piloting electronic transmission since 2014. Actually, the first pilot started in 2011 but not in the form that it is presently. So, INEC is very willing to do electronic transmission. However, the only reason why we need a law in that particular case is that the present law already provided for how transmission of results should be done and it is a manual process. We cannot override the law; it is already provided for in the Electoral Act, how results will be transmitted. It is already there in the law and it is a manual process.
“So, for you to change that to electronics, you have to live with the existing one, that is why we are waiting for a clear legal backing to be able to do that. Otherwise, we will be infringing on the existing law. That’s why we are seeking for a clear legal provision to override the existing one.”
But while the commission has jettisoned its enviable innovation on electronic transmission of results, citing legal handicap, actors in the opposition parties are bemused that the same INEC plans to go ahead with simultaneous accreditation and voting in next month election, as against accreditation of all voters before commencement of voting in the 2015 Electoral Act as amended.
The spokesman of Inter- Party Advisory Council alerted the nation of what he called the inherent fraud in simultaneous accreditation and voting in next month election since 2018 Electoral Act Amendment Bill was not passed into law by President Buhari. He told newsmen that in the absence of electronic transmission of result, it was wrong for INEC not to have jettisoned simultaneous accreditation and voting, as he noted that it was subject to abuse.
He said: “Equity demands that we go with the accreditation system of the 2015 Electoral Act which stipulates that you accredit, wait until accreditation is concluded before voting. What we are demanding is that there be certificate of accreditation. The political party agents will be furnished with the total number of accredited voters. This will save us from the possibility of the elections being overrun by the security agencies and figures being turned in.”
Ibeano, however, disagreed as he claimed that INEC reserves the discretion on the mode to adopt in collation of results, saying: “I don’t think that has anything at all to do with the unsigned bill, because there is already a provision in the Electoral Act about voting procedure. There was an amendment in the Electoral Act 2015. Actually Section 52 of the Electoral Act by creating a new subsection 2, that subsection 2 is clear that the procedure shall be as determined by the Commission and the Commission has determined after consultation that the continuous accreditation and voting is what should be used.”
PVCs, Incident Forms and allied matters
To allay fears of political parties who have expressed doubt on INEC fidelity to a transparent process, Professor Yakubu, who has since given the consolidated figures of voters in the coming election as 84,004, 084 also declared that while Permanent Voters Cards and Smart Card Readers would be sustained in the accreditation of voters, the Incident Form has since been abolished.
He further revealed that prospective voters with PVC but whose thump print were not identified by the Smart Card Reader would be allowed to vote after writing their phone numbers against their names and passport in the manual voters register.
“However, where the biometric authentication fails, the voter will be required to thumbprint a box next to his/her picture on the register and to enter his/her mobile telephone number before proceeding to vote. The commission has modified the Register of Voters for the 2019 General Elections accordingly. Consequently, the separate Incident Form used in previous elections which is only completed by the Presiding Officer without the involvement of the voter is now abolished. Similarly, the claim that the Card Reader has been enhanced to recapture voters’ fingerprints at polling units and automatically overwrite the biometric record on our database is untrue and should be disregarded.”
While calling on prospective voters who registered but have not picked their PVC to proceed to where they registered to pick such PVC, he restated his Commission stance that no one would be allowed to pick such PVC by proxy.
But in spite its assurance of insulation from the Presidency, INEC will need to do more to convince the opposition that its composition was not meant to favour entrenched interest of a particular section of the country. Findings revealed that while the leadership of the two adhoc committees created so far are from the North: Amina Zakari and Retired Air Vice Marshal Ahmed Mu’azu, chairmenn of the Committee on Results Collation and Electoral Logistics Committee respectively, the Director Voters Register, Iro Gambo is also from the North. There have equally been reservations about the security architecture of the country, which is equally skewed against other sections of the country. Spokesperson of IPAC, Ugochinyere, expressed this fear last Monday.
He said: “The two committees he set up are from the same section and lineage. The people in charge of transportation and distribution of materials are made up of the paramilitaries you know are from one region. Interior Minister is the head of Security Committee of the APC Presidential elections campaign committee.”
Despite the perceived imbalances, the main man in the eye of the storm, the incumbent president and APC presidential candidate, Buhari, has continued to assure that he would ensure that the electoral process was free and fair. Addressing the gathering of his party faithful last Monday during the inauguration of the APC Presidential Campaign Council, President Buhari said he was determined to bequeath a legacy of free,fair and transparent elections.
He said: “We have insisted that votes must count and have maintained a policy of non-interference in elections. INEC has so far since 2015, conducted fair and credible elections in 195 constituencies nationwide, which have been attested nationwide to be qualitatively better than previous elections.
“Let me reiterate my commitment to free and fair elections. If there is one legacy I want to leave is the enthronement of democracy as a system of government. And for democracy to be enthroned, elections must be free and fair.
“That means citizens have a right to vote for candidates of their choice without intimidation in any form. I have warned INEC and security agencies to that effect. We will keep insisting that votes must count. Our campaigns will be anchored on our performance in the last four years.”
But will Buhari walk his talk?