The Director of the Abuja School of Social and Political Thoughts, Sam Amadi, has stated that the leadership of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) compromised Nigeria’s 2023 elections.
Amadi, a former Executive Chairman and CEO of the Nigerian
Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), argued that it was INEC officials who
rigged the 2023 election, not the All Progressives Congress (APC), as widely
believed.
He made this comment on Tuesday in Abuja during an
interactive conference on electoral reform titled “Setting the Agenda,” held at
Merit House and organized by the Civil Society Coalition for Sustainable
Development.
Amadi said, “There is no lesson to learn from the last election in Ghana. Everything Ghana did right, we could also do. For example, we have improved in the timely delivery of electoral materials and in margin logistics.
“We have a much more bankable and digitalized electoral
register. So we’ve got everything right. But what we failed to get right is the
fact that our electoral commission is partisan.
“Essentially, you are organizing elections in a third-world
country where digital illiteracy is still a challenge, and where openness and
transparency are lacking.
“For instance, many of us don’t even know the salaries of
national assembly members. Elsewhere, this kind of information is uploaded and
easily accessible.
“Expenditure oversight is also critical. Money is receipted,
spent, and verified by oversight offices. Many legislators in the UK have been
sacked for spending public funds on luxury hotels instead of moderate
accommodations or for giving money to girlfriends or family members.
“Similarly, in the United States, many lawmakers have been
prosecuted for campaign finance violations. Donations meant for campaigns have
been traced to their families. These examples show better transparency abroad.
Crucially, they do not appoint partisan individuals to their electoral bodies.
“Here, we give the president the power to appoint his
brothers, party members, and loyalists to the electoral commission, and then we
expect accurate reporting after the votes are counted. Or that they will not
switch off the server during the process.
“We could have had a perfect election in 2023, but we didn’t
because the INEC chairman and his members essentially rigged the election.
“I have said it before: APC didn’t rig the election; INEC
rigged it.”
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