Oby Ezekwesili, former minister of education, on Tuesday joined protesters at the national assembly over senate’s rejection of real-time electronic transmission of election results.
On February 4, the Senate passed an amendment to the
Electoral Act, reducing the timeline for the Independent National Electoral
Commission (INEC) to publish a notice of election results from 360 days to 180
days.
The senate also ruled out the mandatory real-time
transmission of results.
Addressing journalists at the protest ground, Ezekwesili
said the senate must not be allowed to pass an “ambiguous” provision that
grants discretionary powers instead of making electronic transmission
compulsory.
“I have been particularly loud in stating that if the senate
gets away with a provision that is ambiguous, that gives power of discretion to
determine the ifs and the buts, instead of making the clause mandatory, that
every vote must count in this country,” she said.
She noted that a mandatory real-time transmission clause is
essential to electoral integrity.
Ezekwesili added that such a provision would prevent a
repeat of controversies surrounding polling unit result sheets in previous
elections.
She accused lawmakers resisting the mandatory clause of
“undermining democracy’.
“The way that our votes will count is to have this mandatory
provision that makes it the core principle of our electoral transparency,” she
said.
“No longer shall our votes be subject to the kinds of
cancellations of results that we saw in EC8A in previous elections,” she said.
“The only reason they don’t want transparency through the
mandatory provision for there to be instant, real-time, electronic transmission
of the results is because they want to continue to capture our democracy.
“The society is labouring under the weight of poor
governance that we have seen so far in our democracy and now the citizens are
saying enough.
“There is no reason why people who call themselves democrats
hate transparency.
“Why are you introducing extraneous laws? If these people
pass any bill that has programmed rigging, we should know that both the
executive and legislature have agreed to rig the election.”
Ezekwesili’s appearance adds to mounting pressure on the
national assembly to retain a mandatory real-time electronic transmission
clause in the amended Electoral Act.
On Febuary 9, Peter Obi, presidential candidate of the
Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 election, led a group of protesters to the
national assembly complex in Abuja over the senate’s rejection of real-time
electronic transmission of election results.
Rotimi Amaechi, former governor of Rivers state and
ex-minister of transportation, also joined protesters in Abuja on February 10
to demand the mandatory electronic transmission of election results.
Advertise on NigerianEye.com to reach thousands of our daily users
No comments
Post a Comment
Kindly drop a comment below.
(Comments are moderated. Clean comments will be approved immediately)
Advert Enquires - Reach out to us at NigerianEye@gmail.com