1 day Ago By JOY ANIGBOGU
Osita Okechukwu, former Director General of Voice of Nigeria (VON) and a chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC) has spoken about the importance of transparent election in the country, saying that there would be no general electoral reforms without the Uwais Report. In this interview, he calls on President Bola Tinubu to adopt the Uwais Report, among other issues. JOY ANIGBOGU brings the excerpts: Leading up to the 2023 election you said that some of the adoption of the Uwais Report by INEC was a vote-rigging vaccine for the last election.
You said that Buhari was going to deliver very good elections because they had the vote-rigging vaccine. But we had an election that was mad in jeopardy. We had technical glitch in the presidential election, which a lot of people still look at with a lot of disdain.
And we had massive irregularities in every part of the country. You preached a vote-rigging vaccine to us, what vaccine are you going to preach this time with the Uwais Report? You are very correct. That was why I said there is a missing link.
That my, our National Assembly, led by Distinguished Senator Jibril Bairau, Benjamin Kalu, and others that made contributions to constitutional electoral reforms, like my friend, Distinguished Senator Salisu Mustafa, and my brother Ikenga Ugochinyere, and others. They did so well. As you said, that there is a missing link.
And that missing link is in the Uwias electoral reform reports. For me, the Uwias reports is divinely inspired. 17 years down the line, that missing link has been that bold.
It still speaks. And you can imagine how Nigeria is so blessed that President Umar Musa Yar’adua, a blessed memory, was elected. And of his own volition, he told the world that the electoral process that brought him to power was flawed.
And less than three months after his inauguration, he set up the 22-man Uwais Electoral Reform Committee. And that committee, among various recommendations, what I have discovered along the line is that there is one missing link. And that missing link is in section 22.
414142. What is he saying? That in the composition of the board of INEC, that they discovered that there is lack of proper, true, well-human beings. If you are not patriotic enough to look back at that report, you will miss that missing link.
That missing link says that all those essential offices, national electoral commissioners, chairman, resident commissioners should all be advertised, so that the general public will know those who have indicated interest. Those who want to be chairman or national electoral commissioner or resident electoral commissioners. And also adding the state INEC, because the state INEC cannot have that trust.
So what is the missing link? It says, if there is an advertisement and a coalition is done, and a shortlist is done, that three out of four of the aspirants, or those who indicated interest, should be shortlisted per office and sent to the National Council of States, where we have all the governors, former presidents, etcetera. Out of the three nominated for each, you select one and send to the Senate. I think, in the absence of the fact that we do not have the powers to go to Almighty God in heaven and tell him, our Lord, please give us good Nigeria so we are in heaven, we must do what God does in Nigeria.
I think that the record, that particular single item is a handgun that I am appealing to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the leadership of the National Assembly, and the state assemblies. That in an effort to amend the constitution and advance a genuine electoral reform, that that item should be included. And I’m one of those, out of the defunct Congress of Progressive Change (C PC) of the APC, who had majority of votes, I decided to remain with Bola Tinubu in APC.
I’m telling Mr. President, it is in your own interest that you should do this legacy. Don’t be afraid you will not lose the election because of that.
Promote a free, fair, and transparent election that will lead to Nigerian development. In your statement you said it’s important so that the June 12th election can become a second place, meaning so that we can have what we can refer to as the most democratic election. But you also specifically mentioned Professor Humphrey Nwosu in that statement.
And of course, we know the conversation that has been happening around him thus far. And what people are saying that if you do not declare an election, it means you did not complete it. So there are so many angles to look at it.
And I’d just like to know your thoughts, specifically because you added in to this endorsing free and fair election. What’s your take on discuss that’s happening around him? The matter has been settled by your team. I’ve listened to you people while the debate was going on, and everything is full of hypocrisy.
Hypocrisy is for one to celebrate MKO Abiola, and even Ambassador Kingibe, who actually did not fight that war. And you leave the man that conducted the election. It’s a matter of hypocrisy.
It is accepted that the election remains the freest in the annals of Nigerian electoral process. And I think that in addition to the vote-rigging machine I talked about, whereby we spent over N300 billion to procure technology, and we missed the point that the managers of the system must be independent, impartial. That they should not owe allegiance to those who appointed them.
That if they were independent, they would conduct an election that would be freer than the one Nwosu conducted. I mentioned Nwosu for the fact that I was in Abuja at that time. I know the pressure that mounted against him and his team not to conduct the election.
So anybody who dismisses it with a wave of hand that to conduct that election was an easy joke, will not forget somebody like late Francis Arthur Nzeribe and Abimbola, and the late Attorney General of the Federation, Clement Akpamgbo, that was behind the scene and moved Justice Ikpeme to give a judgment against the decree, with the decree’s ouster clause, that no court judgment should stop this election. And that judgment was delivered on the 10th of June, 1993. Between that 10th of June, Nwosu was harangued not to hold the election on the 12th.
He insisted on holding that election. That’s why I mention his name. I’m talking of the good of the country.
I’m saying that President Tinubu had done some legacy policies, one of which is the financial autonomy of the local government councils and the Regional Development Intervention Commissions. And if he wants those two items to succeed, he must lay a foundation between now and 2027 for a free, fair and transparent election political culture. Because if we don’t have a free and fair election, the financial autonomy of the local government will collapse at the end of the day, because the governors will do their usual style and nominate their stooges as counselors and chain of counts.
And if he does so, the idea of the financial autonomy that President Tinubu and his attorney general, Lateef Fagbemi, found an alternative means to give the country, with the grace of the Supreme Court, my lord Justices and the Supreme Court, will wither away. So will be the Development Commissions and other development strides. It was Mandela that said, if Nigeria is not respected, Africa will not be respected.
How can we be respected when we are under a flawed democracy? How over 93 million people registered to vote in 2023 and less than three million voted. Is it not lack of confidence in the electoral process? That’s my fear. And I think we can get over it and place Nigeria where the world will recognise us.
And where the foreign direct investment will come unhindered. Because no group ever invests where they have no confidence in the system. That is my canvas.
I’m not saying that the votes rigging vaccine is not there. I just need a supplement to make it work so that nobody will talk of glitch anymore in an election. You have isolated one of the many recommendations of the Uwais panel.
Namely, the fact that the president should not be given the power to appoint whoever is going to be chairman of INEC and that that should pass through the Council of State. But that panel needs some other recommendations. What do you think of those other recommendations? Like independent candidature.
Like that nobody should assume any political office to govern until all legal disputes have been resolved. And then three, that there should be a political party’s registration and regulatory body to oversee the political parties. These are some of the other recommendations.
But the lawmakers that you mentioned at the beginning of this conversation, they are even saying that elections should be held in one day all over the federation instead of having staggered elections. What are your thoughts on these other recommendations? Let me repeat once more that the section 2241 did not the give the president the right to nominate chairman of National electoral commission or the Governor to nominate SIEC. Rather what it said is that it should be publicly advertised.
Can I tell you one of the features why they said the June 12 presidential election is the freest? It’s because there was no legal matter after the election. If you do a transparent election, free, fair, beyond doubt, the Nigerian people are good followers. You might not have any legal angle.
You might not have the need for electoral offences commission and all those niceties. It’s central to erasing the negative mindset we have about the electoral process. You as a president will know that you must do well.
In other words, the voters have the powers to vote you out. You as a governor, at the back of your mind, will be the fact that no matter whoever is advising you, you’ll be aware that the voters have a premium on deciding by their votes. What we have today is not the same thing.
The Nigerian will say, in case they require the papers from me to secure jobs or do so, let me just register and on the election day, you will say why should I go when it will not be free and fair. Those other issues are very germane. But the most central is the fact that a president, a governor, is aware that he didn’t appoint you in that 22-month panel.
Don’t forget that the funding of the electoral commission was selected. It’s still in place. But what are the outcomes? Someone like Professor Attahiru Jega, who was a member of the committee, became a chairman of INEC and his election at the end of the day will also be rated as one of the freest.
So I’m saying that as a human angle, the Nigerian voter has no premium. We need to give them premium so that they will appreciate the weight of the voter’s card. I think what really made that election was President Goodluck Jonathan conceding.
It wasn’t that the elections were free. There were allegations of voter’s paddings, numbers paddings and everything across both political parties. There were some results of those that were heavily contested.
I think the PDP contested the results of Kano and the results of Rivers were contested by the APC. Those were very irregular results. In fact, Professor Attairu Jega had announced it on the floor while they were collecting the results.
So across board, there was still a lot of electoral shenanigans. But my point to you is this. This voters rigging vaccine that you said BVAS was going to fix.
The bulk of the Uwais report have been implemented with those reforms in INEC. The only thing, for instance, it was the Uwais Report talked about deploying NYSC corps members as officers of the elections, it was pretty much implemented. The only part is the nomination part, who nominates, where they talked about the consensus of both political parties as regards getting who becomes the leader of INEC.
The most important part is the electioneering, the counting and accountability, the thoughts we had before the last election, turned out to be flawed when we practiced the election. So that’s why I asked you the question. It’s not about the Uwais report.
It’s about the sanctity of INEC itself. How can we get the sanctity of the institution of INEC? If we talk about Jega’s election, could you, on a pragmatic analysis, compare it to the Iwu’s election of 2007 or 2008? You can’t. We are trying to compare what happened, not the ideal of the utmost 100%.
We are all human beings. But on this issue, the Uwais electoral reform committee said we discovered that lack of independence of the managers of the process led to deficiency and that it cannot be truly and genuinely be called independent. When Osita Okchukw handpicks electoral commissioners, that’s human element.
I know that it might not be 100% after shortlisting and the rest, but there will be some maggots that will be cut off. And it is a point of improvement of one, the standard and quality of our elections. The confidence of the people in the elections that will reduce apathy, because the people have lost confidence.
When they called us in the defunct CPC to leave Tinubu, that he was not fair to us. And we asked them, do you have any programme that could genuinely advance Nigerian democracy? Are you just walking away because you are not appointed or you don’t have access? And we said, if it’s about access, we won’t go with you. Let us plead with Mr.
President to look inwards and improve our electoral process now that the issue of constitutional electoral reform is going on. And I said that one of those items is to divorce the loyalty of the appointees from those appointed. Whether they are bribed later will become a different matter.
They reduce that chances of inducement..
