President Muhammadu Buhari
By Mcdonald Onu
Erstwhile
National Publicity Secretary of the defunct New People’s Democratic Party
(nPDP), Chief Eze Chukwuemeka Eze has described as worthy of commendation,
President Muhammadu Buhari’s assent to the Electoral (Act) Amendment Bill,
passed by the National Assembly to engender transparency and reduce incidences
of fraud and malpractices in Nigeria’s electoral process as the country gears
up for a charged campaign season ahead of the 2023 elections.
In a statement made available to
media houses in Port Harcourt, the Chieftain of the All Progressives Congress
said with the touch of technology and innovation brought into the amended Act,
there are bound to be significant improvements in election and electioneering
processes in the country adding that the Nigerian Lawmakers deserve some
accolades (not all kudos though) for their efforts in ensuring that the amended
Act gets the necessary legislative backing.
“Members of the National Assembly
also deserve commendations for being responsive in this matter and delivering
an Electoral Act that takes power back to the people by arming them with the
necessary tools to make choices at the polls with consequential effects.”
Speaking on innovations in the
amended Act, Chief Eze said aside giving legal backing to the deployment and
use of electronic card readers for voting and transmission of results for
collation, the new law gives the Independent Electoral Commission (INEC) more
decision-making powers and particularly sets aside early funding for it to
avoid the technical and logistic lags that are peculiar to the Commission
during elections.
The party chieftain however joined
President Buhari to frown at the content of Section 84(12) which bars political
appointees from participating either as aspirants or as voting delegates in
their parties’ Primaries to choose who bears their party’s flag in the
elections.
Describing the said section as
grossly inconsistent with the provision of the Nigerian constitution, Eze reminded
Nigerian Lawmakers that the constitution is the ‘fons et origo’ - the origin
and source from whence every other law (including the amended electoral act)
derives their validity.
According to him, “the
constitution is express and clear in situations of this nature when it stated
in Section 1(3) that “if any other law is inconsistent with the provisions of
this constitution, this constitution shall prevail and that other law shall to
the extent of its inconsistency be void.” Section 84(12) of the amended law is
inconsistent with the Nigerian constitution to the extent that it prohibits
political appointees from participating in the internal electoral processes of
the parties to which they belong.
Recall that while assenting to the
bill, President Mohammadu Buhari made his reservations about the controversial
section 84(12) and called for quick amendment to settle the controversy.
According to the President, ...“the practical application of section 84(12) of
the Electoral Bill, 2022 will, if assented to, by operation of law, subject
serving political office holders to inhibitions and restrictions referred to
under section 40 and 42 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended). It is
imperative to note that the only constitutional expectation placed on serving
political office holders that qualify, by extension, as public officers within
the context of the constitution is resignation, withdrawal or retirement at
least 30 days before the date of the election. Hence, it will be
stretching things beyond the constitutional limit to import extraneous
restrictions into the constitution on account of practical application of
section 84(12) of the bill where political parties’ conventions and congresses
were to hold earlier than 30 days to the election.”
Expressing confidence that the
National Assembly will heed the call from all quarters to quickly reconsider an
amendment to settle the conflict triggered between the Nigerian constitution
and the amended Electoral Act, Eze called on President Muhammadu Buhari to think
the way of making a new request through an Executive Bill to the National
Assembly for an alteration of Section 84(12), noting that failure to alter the
conflicting section might breed distrust between the executive and the National
Assembly going forward and that could negatively impact future bills because
the Lawmakers agreed to an amendment before the President assented to the bill.
He commended Nigerians for their
patience with the President during the pendency of the amendment noting that
Nigerians are the winners as the President through his assent has returned
power back to the real owners; the Nigerian people.
He said those opposing the
totality of the reform in the new electoral law are perpetrators of electoral
fraud and should be watched closely.
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