The senate has passed a bill
amending the electoral act.
The bill was passed on Tuesday
after Suleiman Nazif, chairman of the committee on INEC, presented a report on
the floor of the senate.
In August, President Muhammadu
Buhari rejected the bill because of some issues the lawmakers failed to address
during revision to the bill.
After addressing the concerns of
the president, the bill was reintroduced and subsequently passed.
Senate President Bukola Saraki
had asked the committee to take note of the observations made when the bill was
deliberated upon to be passed the second time.
While presenting the report,
Nazif said all the issues raised by the president had been “captured and
addressed.”
Clause 14 amends section 49 (4)
of the act that deals with the failure of a card reader.
“Where a smart card reader
deployed for accreditation of voters fails to function in a polling unit and a
fresh card reader is not deployed three hours before the close of the election
in that unit, then the election shall not hold but be rescheduled and conducted
within 24 hours, provided that where the total possible votes from all the
affected card readers in the units or unit does not affect the overall result
in the constituency or election concerned,” the report read.
The lawmakers were accused of
removing this clause.
Clause 24 amends section 87 (13)
of the act deals with the deadline for primary elections.
The report said the dates of the
primary polls shall not be earlier than 150 days and not later than 90 days
before the date of election to the elective offices.
Clause 32 amends section 140 (4)
of the act that deals with the omission of name of candidate or logo of a
political party.
It states that if at the point of
display or distribution of ballot papers, a candidate or an agent name or logo
of is omitted, candidate will notify the commission and it shall rectify and
fix another date not later 90 days.
The bill pegged spending limits for
presidential, gubernatorial, senatorial and house of reps candidates at N5
billion, N1 billion, N250 million and N150 million respectively.
The senators passed the amendment
after a clause-by-clause consideration of the bill.
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