Femi Gbajabiamila, speaker of the house of representatives,
says the ninth national assembly is working to ensure that the electoral act
amendment bill doesn’t compromise Nigeria’s sovereignty, when signed into law.
Earlier in July, the house had passed the electoral
amendment bill, adopting e-transmission of results where practicable.
While hosting a team of the European Union (EU) delegation
in Nigeria led by Samuela Isopi, the head of mission, on Wednesday, the speaker
said no country has a perfect electoral system, but the national assembly is
making serious efforts to make Nigeria’s electoral law to be in tune with the
country’s peculiarities.
“You talked about the much talked about electoral act
amendment. For you to have a good democracy, you need to have a good electoral
law. Our electoral law is not perfect, just like your own is not perfect,” he
said.
“But our goal is to
make it perfect. That’s why in the ninth assembly, we try to see that we make
our electoral act to be perfect. We took our time to be thorough without
sacrificing anything.
“Today, we’re at the threshold of history. We want to have
an electoral act that is acceptable to the majority of Nigerians. We want an
electoral act that does not compromise the sovereignty of Nigeria. That’s key
to us. Nigeria is a very plural society in terms of religion and ethnicity.
These are some of the considerations we have to make.”
Gbajabiamila, who congratulated the new head of EU mission
in Nigeria on her appointment, said “I believe with a lot of collaboration, we
can do a lot and greater things together.”
On her part, Isopi said the visit was to introduce herself
as the new head of mission of EU in Nigeria, and to give assurances of EU’s
commitment to strengthening its partnership with Nigeria, and the national
assembly, as well as to formally announce the coming of a special mission later
in November.
She said since 1999, the union had been a major partner in
promoting Nigeria’s democracy, especially in the area of supporting the
national assembly on electoral matters, women and the youth.
“We have closely followed the developments here, and I’ll
like to applaud the approach that the national assembly has taken in the
electoral amendment. We’ll continue to support democratic governance and
institutions in Nigeria,” she said.
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