BREAKING: Major opposition parties kick against Senate’s rejection of electoral reform
The rejection of key reforms to the Electoral Act by the Nigerian Senate has elicited a reaction from major opposition parties in the country.
The opposition parties in a joint statement issued on Thursday said the rejection of the real-time electronic transmission of results from polling units is retrogressive.
The statement, signed by spokespersons for the Peoples Democratic Party, Ini Ememobong; African Democratic Congress, Bolahi Abdullahi, New Nigeria Peoples Party, Ladipo Johnson said the action of the senate is capable of derailing the nation’s hard-earned democracy.
“With this anti-people and anti-democratic action, we are concerned that the APC-led Senate may have set Nigeria’s democracy back by many decades. It is therefore not surprising that it has deservedly attracted widespread opposition and condemnation from Nigerians across all divides.
“We are at a loss as to why a party that is currently deploying technology to run an e-registration of their members across the country is averse to using technology to transmit results.
“We therefore harbour no doubts about the intention of the All Progressives Congress (APC), which is in firm control of the two chambers of the National Assembly. They know Nigerians are fed up with them. They are aware of the rejection that awaits them at the forthcoming polls,” the statement read.
It also stated that it is obvious that a free and fair election has therefore become a threat to members of the APC and the Senate.
The parties further stated that it is for this reason that they have to preserve and protect any loopholes that could aid the manipulation of the electoral process to their advantage.
“However, regardless of their party affiliation, we would have expected the Senators to rise above party sentiments and act in the best interest of democracy, for which the legislature remains its most important symbol. But as usual, they failed the people they are supposed to represent.
“In the last election, we are witnesses to the plethora of cases where the court, especially the Supreme Court, held that there was nowhere in the principal Act, which is the Electoral Act 2022, where electronic transmission was made mandatory and therefore the act is lacking in legislative parentage. This immediately signalled a lacuna that needed to be urgently fixed to ensure that future elections do not suffer the same fate.
“However, beyond providing a basis for judicial action in future, the electronic transmission will increase transparency, trust and belief in the electoral process, which in turn will deepen and consolidate democracy in our country. With this rejection, the Senate has returned Nigeria to square one,” the statement added.
The parties also noted that the ball is now in the court of the conference committee which is expected to align itself with Nigerians to adopt the position of the House of Representatives on mandatory real-time electronic transmission of election results.
They call on the committee to ensure that they do not act as politicians, whose eyes and thoughts are only on the next elections, but as statesmen, who should have the next generation in mind.
“We are trusting that they will act in the best interest of the people, to forestall the negative consequences that may result in foisting anti-democratic laws on the people,” the opposition parties said.
