JAILBOUND
Fear of possible imprisonment grips INEC top brass
•Moves to upturn tribunal verdicts in Abia, Edo, Enugu
By Linus Obogo
Saturday,
April 19, 2008
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•Iwu,
INEC Boss
Photo: Sun News Publishing
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Terrified by possible criminal prosecution that may be brought
against it when the various elections petition tribunals scattered
across the country finally wind up their sittings, the Independent
National Electoral Commission (INEC), in apparent last-ditch
effort, may have concluded plans to ensure the reversal of
some of the tribunals’ unfavorable judgments against
it.
It has suddenly dawned on the commission that it could well
be sitting on a keg of gunpowder if it did not do anything
to address the present perception that it aided the rigging
of the last general elections, especially against the backdrop
that election malpractice has already been criminalized by
the subsisting constitution of the federal republic.
Since the April 2007 elections, an exercise that has come
under severe local and international bashing, the nation’s
electoral umpire has remained mired in credibility crisis,
bordering on alleged fraud, duplicity, connivance, as well
as active aiding of election riggings.
SATURDAY SUN gathered that the commission
is particularly irked by the tendency to put the blame for
everything that went wrong with the last general election
on INEC, insisting that INEC, directly or indirectly, could
not have been responsible for more than 5% of whatever went
wrong.
But spooked by the damning verdicts which have emanated from
the tribunals, particularly Abia, Edo, Enugu and Bayelsa,
the commission is highly disturbed that unless it seeks ways
to upturn the panels’ pronouncements from these states,
it would not only have to live with its chequered reputation
as a debased umpire, but equally contend with the possibility
of its officers being sent to jail on account of fraud.
INEC is also eager to put it on record that the situation
in Kogi was not a case of rigged election, but that of exclusion
of a candidate, pointing out that even at that, the commission
based its decision on a government white paper – until
that time, a valid law of the land.
INEC’s latest fears, according to a highly placed official
in the agency who spoke to SATURDAY SUN on condition of anonymity,
derives from the fact that any election annulled on the basis
of perceived shortcomings of the commission, risks its officials
being sent to jail if criminal prosecution is preferred against
it.
According to the source, it is this likely scenario that the
commission is determined to avert by making sure that it pursues
to logical conclusion and upturn some of the unpalatable judgments
like the ones in Abia, Edo, Enugu and probably Bayelsa States
which tend to cast a slur on its integrity as an independent
electoral umpire.
Clarifying why INEC would not relent in appealing some of
the trribunals’ ruling, a top shot of the commission
and who is also very close to the national chairman, Professor
Maurice Iwu, conceded that like any other institution in the
country, the agency (INEC) cannot wholly appropriate absolute
perfection to itself. He, however, insists that the commission
would not yield itself to be demonized for a few exceptional
glitches not exactly occasioned by it.
With specific reference to Abia, Edo and Enugu States, where
INEC accused the tribunals of acting ultra-vires, the commission,
while taking umbrage at the rulings, has vowed to disprove
the panels’ position in these three states, if anything,
to stave off indictments it has been exposed to and which
might be capitalized upon in the future by litigation mongers.
Abia
Faulting the tribunal’s ruling voiding Governor Theodora
Orji’s election on the grounds of belonging to a secret
cult as well as non-resignation of his previous appointment
as Chief of Staff to the former governor, in what is now a
harvest of appeals at the Appeal Court, given the massive
number of appeals by stakeholders involved in the matter,
INEC is appealing the decision of the lower tribunal on 14
grounds including membership of Ogwugwu Akpu and non-resignation
of public service positions.
Flaying the award of victory to Onyema Ugochukwu’s Peoples
Democratic Party (PDP), INEC, while deflating the tribunal’s
judgment, chaired by Justice Yusuf Abdullahi, argues that
since the tribunal punctured Ugochukwu's claim of electoral
malpractices, saying that the results he tendered were based
on hearsay, and that since election results are based on hard
evidence and not mere mathematical projections and permutations,
Ugochukwu was not supposed to be declared the winner.
Expressing optimism that its good name would be saved at the
appellate court, the commission’s highly placed insider
source contended that Ugochukwu who is cross-appealing on
14 grounds, that the lower tribunal's judgment failed to prove
that Orji scored majority of lawful votes cast at the governorship
election "to entitle them to being returned as duly elected",
as well as their argument that the judgment was delivered
against the weight of evidence available to the tribunal,
would be floored at the Court of Appeal.
While the commission may not have been directly fingered in
the integrity of the poll in the state, it, however, expressed
worries over the action of the tribunal to invalidate someone’s
victory on a speculative basis of being a member of a secret
cult.
Even at that, INEC reasons, being a member of a secret cult
and having not resigned previous appointments (and therefore
not qualifying to stand election are all pre-election matters
that should not have anything to do with the tribunal.
Edo
Unlike the scenario in Abia, INEC is particularly miffed that
an honourable tribunal, consisting of distinguished members
of the bench could brazenly arrogate to themselves the power
to allot figures to a party to a dispute in a manner they
did.
“They took up the job of an electoral commission, counting
votes, working out all the mathematical calculations, and
declaring results. All these are jobs for the commission.
They could have either ordered a recount or, at worst, a bye-election,
and not doing the additions and declaring another person winner”,
the source said.
In a historic judgment on Thursday March 20, 2007, the Chairman
of the Edo State Election Petitions Tribunal, Justice Peter
Umeadi, ruled that Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, the gubernatorial
candidate of the Action Congress political party scored 166,577
votes against 129,057 for Professor Oserheimen Osunbor, the
gubernatorial candidate of the incumbent People's Democratic
Party.
However, as unpopular as the Edo poll was reckoned in the
eyes of those who followed the proceeding, INEC still insists
it did its best.
Bayelsa
In the most scathing denigration of INEC’s claim of
a governorship election in the state, the Appeal Court sitting
in Port Harcourt, in their unanimous judgment, which lasted
for five hours, the five-man jury held that no governorship
election held in Bayelsa State on April 14, 2007. It therefore
compelled the electoral umpire to conduct a fresh poll in
the state within 90 days.
With the appeal battle now lost, following the order for a
fresh poll, the fear of a criminal action action genuinely
lurks for Professor Iwu-led body.
Enugu
Even though the commission initially withdrew its appeal on
the tribunal ruling on Enugu governorship election, it has
since carried out detail appraisal of the judgment and resolved
to return to appeal. It however optimistic that Sullivan Chime
will not travel the route of Adamawa, Kogi and Bayelsa.
But should Enugu cave in, it would be so much that it did
not do a good job in the state, but it will be due largely
to forces outside the integrity of the poll that brought Chime
to power. And if Chime is washed off like his counterparts
in Adamawa, Kogi and Bayelsa, the development will further
reinforce the nightmare currently haunting INEC of a looming
day of reckoning.
Move to nail ex-senate president, deputy-gov
While the commission believes that it is capable of rising
above board, given the right climate, as was the case in the
last bye-election in Kogi, it believes strongly that there
are elements outside the commission constituting the major
problems confronting it.
Again, an official of INEC insists: “The desperation
to win at all costs often leads politicians to lobby INEC
officials. This act leads to bribery of the electoral officials,
who mostly are adhoc staff, and even the security operatives
who ordinarily should ensure safety of people and materials
at the venue”.
Perhaps it is against this backcloth that the commission,
while still smarting from the role allegedly played by the
former senate president, Ken Nnmani, in disrupting the April
election in Enugu State, is mulling over instituting a criminal
proceeding against him and a deputy governor from one of the
South-west states who reportedly carried ballot boxes to his
house.
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