04042019 - Nigeria 7 other nstions home to world's hungriest - UN

28 — Vanguard, THURSDAY, APRIL 4, 2019
Mr Festus Ogwuche is a
senior legal practitioner
based in Port Harcourt,
Rivers State. In this
interview, he gives insight
into the issues of
suspension of electoral
process by the Independent
National Electoral
Commission, INEC, and
role of the military during
the 2019 polls.
Excerpts:
From a legal perspective,
how would you describe the
recent elections conducted
by INEC?
I will describe the 2019
elections in one word -
bizarre. Yes, bizarre in the
sense that it came with
certain features which one
considers incomprehensible.
As a third world country and
yet a fledgling democracy, it
is not within anybody’s
expectation that we blaze
trails in elections, at least for
now. But the idea of
postponing elections on the
very day of the polls is
jolting. This is not
withstanding the cogency of
the factors responsible for
that because under no
circumstance can an election
be postponed in the US. Then
we have the umpire
scheduling supplementary
elections after it had declared
a winner and issued him with
a certificate of return.
Within the purview of law
and the Electoral Act, is
supplementary election
permissible?
Supplementary elections are
the product of the
imagination of INEC officials
who engaged it as subterfuge
to manipulate the process
and swing the electoral
pendulum in the direction
that suits them at any
material time. It is tagged
with inconclusive elections
and this has become
somewhat the tradition from
the death of Prince Abubakar
Audu, when it first reared its
ugly head in our political
terrain. But now, we have a
better understanding of what
it entails and where it targets.
Some of us boldly challenge
the legality of this coinage.
The issue thereby becomes
whether or not our
jurisprudence allows for the
introduction of extraneous
considerations in the
implementation of laws.
There is nothing in the law
envisaging the possibility of
a supplement in the polls.
Then again the challenge
becomes the distinct features
in the process that would
make it require a supplement
beyond the declaration of its
twin coinage in inconclusive
elections.
What specific part of the
electoral act do you think
should be amended?
The issue here is not about
amendments per se, but
rather about wholesome
08152060944
Uwais C’ttee recommendations best roadmap for
free, fair elections -----Ogwuche
By Davies Iheamnacho
•Ogwuche
reforms to bring our electoral
system in tandem with
international best practices
and to reduce fraud,
malfeasance and violence in
the system. Several attempts
were made in the past in this
direction but the obviously
genuine efforts were all
frustrated. For instance our
very dear late President
Musa Yar'adua took one look
at the process that enthroned
him in the saddle and was not
quite comfortable with it. He
knew that the process of his
emergence was faulty and
unacceptable, and he
constituted an electoral
reform committee headed by
the venerable retired Justice
Uwais. The committee did
tremendous work on this
mandate, received
tremendous inputs from the
vast array of our national
diversity and came up with
compelling recommendations
that should have nailed the
hiccups and loopholes in our
elections directly on the
head.
As far as I am concerned, the
Uwais committee
recommendations are the
road map to the guarantee of
free, fair and credible
elections in Nigeria. It made
far reaching prescriptions
that would have transmuted
our electoral misfortunes to
platforms of civility and
decency. It sought for an all
encompassing composition of
INEC that would guarantee
the integrity of polls and
sanctity of the ballot in this
country. We have seen clearly
that all the recourse to
academic citadels for
appointments particularly of
the INEC chair, is merely
cosmetic and does not solve
any problem. Elections are
not academic ventures and
do not require any scholarly
exertion.
Then again, the issue of
unbundling INEC by the
creation of the Political
Parties Registration and
Regulation Commission, the
Electoral Offence
Commission and the
Constituency Delimitation
Commission as a measure of
injecting life and efficiency
into the electoral system. The
issue of independent
candidacy was amply
recommended and this is in
the face of the current global
trends in democracy with its
gradual shift from party
systems. And it is also to
bring the system within
Nigeria’s international
obligations particularly in the
face of the recent
pronouncement of the
African Court of Human
Rights in the case of Mtilika
and Law Society of
Tanganyika vs Republic of
Tanzania - wherein the court
You cannot talk
about a proper
remedy for
victims in this
circumstance
when the
monsters of
violence still
bestride the
political
landscape like
colossus and are
ravaging the
land
in construing Article 13 of
the African Charter, stated
emphatically that to deny
independent candidates the
right to participate as
candidates in an election
contravenes Article 13 of the
Charter and is an
infringement on fundamental
rights.
The Uwais panel strongly
prescribed the amendment of
the constitution on the issue
of independent candidature
to bring it in conformity with
international law,
particularly the African
Charter on Democracy,
Governance and Elections
and the ECOWAS Protocol
on Democracy and Elections.
But in spite of the noble
objectives for the setting up
of the panel, the National
Assembly which was then
composed more of the
beneficiaries of the
monumental sham Professor
Iwu called the 2007 elections,
took one look at the
document and threw it
overboard. Reason is that it
could upturn their positions
which from every of its intent
and purpose, is parochial
and self- serving. These are
the same people who now
find themselves in the
opposition and are crying
foul. They forgot that what
goes round comes round. My
group has employed all
available means to make
case for the full
implementation of the Uwais
report. Unfortunately, it has
not yielded any result that’s
fruitful. What we saw was a
semblance of it in the setting
up of another panel headed
by Senator Ken Nnamani. We
expressed some misgivings
and scepticism over the
panel’s capacity in terms of
whether it will do a better job
than that of Hon. Justice
Uwais. Today, we are
vindicated as the Nnamani
group did not turn out
anything that is superior to
Uwais'. And so it has become
somewhat a merry go round
affair until the National
Assembly gave its nod to the
amended electoral act which
should have brought
innovations that would
enhance the electoral
process. President Buhari
declined his assent as
required and the polarisation
of members of the National
Assembly along party lines
made it an uphill task for the
requisite constitutional
consensus that would
overrule the President.
Before he became President,
Buhari was very vocal on
electoral reforms, and what
we see now is a complete
volte face with his earlier
position when he was
struggling for the position.
That’s how bad it is.
In the last election, several
persons were victims of
election violence. What
remedies do you think are
available for them?
In defining what should be
remedy for victims of
electoral violence, one should
start from the point of view
of the extent to which
perpetrators are brought to
book. People who perpetrate
violence during elections are
seldom apprehended and
prosecuted and the reason for
this is not farfetched - they
are paid servants of political
big wigs who are always
disposed to shielding them
from the long arms of the law.
The unfortunate thing is that
this has somewhat buoyed up
their activities that violence
appears to be accepted as
part of our elections. You
cannot talk about a proper
remedy for victims in this
circumstance when the
monsters of violence still
bestride the political
landscape like colossus and
are ravaging the land.
Somebody once suggested
the enactment of an Electoral
Offences Act. Again, one
may find it difficult to
articulate a proper remedy for
a victim of election violence
in the face of the mounting
involvement of the state in
the said violence as we
recently witnessed in the last
elections, particularly in
Rivers State and Kano. Until
the warfare element is
expunged from our electoral
process, people will still look
forward to elections with
anxiety, fear and trepidation,
and when that becomes the
case, then no remedy
contained either in the law or
prescribed as an interim
recourse can assuage the
feelings of the victim.
For instance, no attempt has
been made for a data for
victims of electoral violence.
Politicians are only interested
in the collation of votes and
declaration of results but
none appears to be interested
to find out who and who were
killed or maimed at the end
of the day. Each election and
everything that came with it
are forgotten as soon as the
results are announced and no
measures are put in place to
curtail whatever vice that
crystallised thereby. So, it is
doubtful if the National Office
of Statistics or the Human
Rights Commission has any
figure or data on the victims
of electoral violence. Note
again that in construing
victims in the sense of
elections, it must be seen
from the perspective also of
pre- and post-elections such
as those who died or suffered
injuries at political campaign
rallies as in Rivers and Kano,
and those attacked in the
aftermath of the polls as in
Zamfara, Adamawa and
Southern Kaduna. Well, the
families of dead victims
should be compensated and
those lucky to be alive may
approach the courts for
preservation of their
fundamental rights and may
also take advantage of
measures available under the
canopy of some international
organisations such as the UN
to abide by its obligations to
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