From Iheanacho Nwosu,Abuja
The last couple of weeks have been eventful for the Ken Nnamani- led Electoral Reforms Committee. The panel is racing against time. It wants to turn in its report on or before the end of this month.
“We are working day and night to submit our report after the Easter or at month end, a member of the committee told Daily Sun.”
In line with that objective the committee last week held a retreat to put a finishing touch to its report. To a large extent, the panel has executed what seems the most difficult part of its assignment, which is an organising zonal conferences. However, in spite of that, few factors may still work against the timeline set by the panel. First, expectations are, understandably, high on what the committee should churn out. It is being benchmarked against the works of the Justice Mohammed Uwais committee that earlier articulated how best the electoral system could be reformed.
The Nnamani committee is aware of this and may even prefer to delay the submission of its report and get everything right than rush out with a report that would be punctured.
For the records the committee was set up in October 2016 by the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami. The mandate handed to the committee was to, among other things, tinker with the nation’s extant electoral laws with a view to making them address current challenges.
The Minister had said “it is important to evaluate our democratic journey thus far with a view to fashioning out a more enduring system that will serve present and future generations”.
He said recent judicial decisions have shown that there was urgent need to scale up confidence in the country’s electoral system.
Malami further counseled “the committee is also advised to take a holistic look at the recommendations of Justice Uwais Electoral Reform Committee”.
The setting up of the committee, understandably, elicited some controversies from key political actors. While some, especially members of the governing All Progressives Congress (APC) and supporters of President Muhammadu Buhari hailed the move; scores of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) members flayed it.
Second republic politician Chief Guy Ikokwu, a lawyer, argued that the Nnamani committee was “a ploy to waste our time and meager resources just like the piecemeal amendments of the constitution. Our democracy cannot be deepened by inconclusive election exercises or the inadequacies of a truly non independent INEC.
“See how nations like Columbia, Hungary, Britain, India and even South Africa recently conducted polls and referendum without government interference or tampering with due process, but our integrity is low and not an example to other black nations even with our human resources.
“All the restructuring exercise can be done this year before we or they auction off our dear national assets and consign our children to an inordinately insidious and enigmatic bondage. A purpose and strong leadership should look to the future and a worthwhile and beneficial legacy. We should reverse these 56 years of militarized unitary mindset and one man governance in all our tiers of governance to reduce the cost of governance and be very development as time is of the essence.”
To Mr. Yinka Odumakin, Publicity Secretary of the Pan-Yoruba Socio-Political Organisation, Afenifere, ‘’it is unfortunate that our presidency appears to lack institutional memory not to know that Uwais has dealt with this matter. A person like Senator Ken Nnamani should be able to remind those who offered him this job that the 2014 national Conference which he was a member also dealt extensively with electoral reforms. If we said Jonathan should have used the money spent on national conference to pay ASUU, what is the justification for wasting our money on what was already dealt with at a time we are in recession?”
Nnamani did not put up a counter poise to the claims of Ikokwu and Odumakin but he did not accept their claims either. Instead he weighed into the debate on how best to stop inconclusive elections that marked most of the outings of Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) last year.
He said “the issue of inconclusive election in the country affects national election which leads to loss of lives and the best way to handle it is to stop inconclusive election. The best way to stop it in advance is to support the government in implementing what will make Nigeria have a non-violence election”.
Although some politicians do not question the integrity and intellectual capacity of Nnamani to deliver in the assignment given to him by the President, they were not comfortable with his political alignment. One of such persons who stepped into public domain to criticize his membership of APC was the Ekiti state Governor, Ayo Fayose. He called on the former Senate President to quit his job on account of his affiliation to APC.
According to Governor Fayose Ken Nnamani should be replaced with a non-partisan person, saying “if the federal government is serious about electoral reform, Senator Nnamani, a card carrying member of the All Progressives Congress (APC) won’t head the Electoral Reform Committee.”
He raised another controversy by arguing that there was nothing wrong with the electoral laws as presently packaged, adding that “it was the same electoral system that produced the present APC government of President Muhammadu Buhari, in an election adjudged as relatively free, fair and credible.
“So what happened to the system after May 29, 2015 that this present government took over? How did we get to this level of inconclusive and questionable elections in which the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and security agencies appear to have become part of the ruling party?”
Governor Fayose maintained that “even when it inherited a working system that conducted elections adjudged as free and fair by local and international communities, INEC has failed consistently to replicate the inherited working system due to overzealousness and rabid passion to work as appendage of the federal government.
“Imagine an election that is ongoing, only for INEC to postpone counting of votes by midnight, with the party agents driven away. Any result announced in the morning has lost any credibility and legitimacy and cannot represent the will of the people.”
He further argued “the only time this country made an attempt at a reliable electoral reform was during the tenure of President Umaru Yar’Adua who appointed retired Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Mohammed Uwais as the chairman. This singular move gave the panel credibility, widespread acceptability and massive supports from all over the country and across political divides. Such cannot be said of this panel that is overshadowed with massive moral burdens and conflict of interest as a result of the chairman being a card carrying member of a political party called APC.”
Fayose insisted that ; “Senator Ken Nnamani, being the South-East regional leader of APC is incapable of rising above primordial and party sentiments to give Nigerians anything different from electoral inconclusiveness that we have at the moment. Any reform from such encapsulation can as well be said to be dead on arrival.”
Nnamani did not let Fayose’s claims go unattended to. He dismissed the insinuation that he would influence the outcome of his committee’s report in favour of his party.
To a large extent even critics of Nnamani could hardly hold onto such argument. He cut the current image he has because of some lofty roles he played in the past even as a PDP chieftain and a Senate President.
Dr Obiora Okonkwo, a PDP Chieftain said “Nnamani takes his name seriously. It does not matter the party he belongs, he would always execute his assignment professionally and in the interest of the nation, not in the interest of a select few. I am 100 percent sure that his committee will make Nigerians happy with the report they will submit to the government”, the PDP Senatorial candidate said.
At the last count, the committee held consultations in six geo political zones that make up the polity. At its South- East meeting which took place at Nike Lake Enugu, Nnamani spoke extensively on key areas that the committee would focus on.
He listed the key areas as: “reformation of electoral system, aimed at candidates winning elections only from the people’s vote at the polling booths not at the Court”. He explained that “this is the main reason President Muhammadu Buhari, who is a guinea-pig of electoral malpractice, convoked this constitutional and electoral reform committee.”
Senator Nnamani decried the lack of free, fair and transparent elections, which he said have “caused a lot of harm in our polity.”
He called for the overhauling of “all the unnecessary laws to provide for first line charge of funding for the Independent National Electoral Commission-INEC; an unbundling of INEC, resting of the burden of proof on INEC, among other recommendations.”
Also speaking during the event, the Enugu State Chief Judge, Justice Ngozi Emehelu called for an extension of the 180 days statutory period within which election petition cases are adjudicated.
Emehelu said the stipulated time was inadequate for petitioners to prove their cases. She said that petitioners appeared to have an uphill task proving their cases because of limited time, noting that some sections of the electoral act needed to be updated to create more time for adjudication, adding that “there have been cases where petitions are well fought but lost because the proper reliefs are not sought by parties. We recommend that the tribunal be given legal teeth to make consequential orders to grant such reliefs not sought,” she said.
The Justice said that the electoral act had been constantly criticised due to inherent flaws, notwithstanding several alterations, saying that “we recommend that the report of the Justice Uwais committee should be called into play when your committee is doing its work,” she said.
Emehelu also called for the employment of more judges across the country to make up for lost time by the courts, especially because several judges are enrolled to adjudicate on election matters.
In her remarks, a representative of the Transition Monitoring Group (TMG), Mrs. Miriam Menkiti said that amendments of relevant laws needed to be made to provide for an electoral offences commission.
Menkiti also called for the amendment of Section 221 of the Constitution to provide for independent candidacy in the electoral process. She said that all sections of the constitution or electoral act that used one gender needed to be amended in order to check gender discrimination.
Women’s Leader of APC, in the region, Lolo Queen Nwankwo, on her part, called for affirmative action for women especially in the face of the current economic recession facing the country.
Interestingly, the recent passage of amendments to the 2015 Electoral Act by the Senate has, rightly turned attention to the Nnamani Committee. It has also raised huge fears about the place of the committee’s report when it is submitted.
It has also raised huge fears about the place of the committee’s report when it is submitted. Many had thought that recommendations of the Nnamani committee would form party of the key aspects of the Senate’s constitution amendment.
“I don’t know what will become of the Nnamani committee. I had thought that the Senate will accommodate the recommendations of the committee”, Dr Femi Olufunmilade, Head of Department, Political Science of Igbibedion University, Okada, Edo state, said.