By Emeka Alex Duru
Are Nigerians in for a new sequence in the electoral process that would see the presidential poll coming last in 2019 general elections? This is an issue the executive and legislative arms of the present administration are expected to provide comprehensive answers to, in the days ahead. And that is, if ever they will.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), had on Tuesday, January 9, 2018, released a timetable on the schedule of activities for the 2019 general elections.
According to the release, Presidential and National Assembly elections will hold on February16, 2019 while governorship and State Assembly elections will be conducted on Saturday, March, 2, 2019.
But the National Assembly (NASS), has a different idea on the order of the polls, at least, going by its Conference Committee on Electoral Act (amendment) Bill, which on Tuesday, (February 6, 2018) adopted a re-ordered sequence of the 2019 general elections, making presidential election last.
The House of Representatives had begun process to amend the Electoral Act 2010 with the inclusion of section 25(1) in the law.
This was to reorder the sequence of the elections, to commence with National Assembly, followed by Governorship and State House of Assembly, and Presidential as last.
In defending their action, Chairman, Senate Committee on INEC, Suleiman Nazif, said that the bill did not in any way violate any provisions of the 1999 Constitution which empowered INEC to fix dates and conduct elections.
He particularly argued that inclusion of section 25(1) which changed the sequence of election from the one earlier released by INEC had not violated any provisions of the laws governing the operations of the electoral body.
His House of Representatives counterpart, Edward Pwajok, agreed, adding that the action of the committee was very necessary in giving credibility to the electoral process and not targeted at anybody.
In his words, “The sequence of election provision in the bill is not targeted at anybody but aimed at giving credibility to the electoral process”.
The hurdle ahead
Though the Committee may have completed its work, there are fears that passage of the Bill into law, may not have an easy sail. There are insinuations, for instance, that even with the agreement of the joint houses of the legislature on the new arrangement, it may not have the blessing of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
At the Lagos State secretariat of the party, a principal officer, who asked not to be named, dismissed the re-ordered sequence, describing it as ambush against the President by the lawmakers.
“It is increasingly becoming clearer to the bench warmers in NASS that even with support from unprincipled forces, they cannot stop President Muhammadu Buhari from being re-elected if he desires to go for a second term. That is why they are laying this booby trap so that they may work in connivance with some governors to frustrate him. But that is mere juvenile ambush. I can assure you that the re-ordered sequence of election is already dead on arrival”, he asserted.
Given the frosty relationship that has existed between the legislature and executive since the inauguration of the current dispensation in 2015, he may have his reasons for being disdainful on the lawmakers over the issue. In fact, analysts see in the move, another reason for the two arms to return to the trenches ahead of the election.
Following the emergence of Bukola Saraki as Senate President and Yakubu Dogara as the Speaker of the House of Representatives, against the permutations and directives of APC leadership, neither the party, nor the Buhari-led executive, had had any rapport with NASS. Virtually all the actions of the two organs of the government have been at daggers drawn, ever since.
It is thus, already being insinuated that the re-ordered sequence of the polls is a strategy by the lawmakers to get at the President. State governors who are not known to be in the good books of the President, or those in opposition parties, are also being seen to be acting in collusion with the legislators, at least to avoid being swept off in the likelihood of a band-wagon voting trend that may follow, if the President manages to win a re-election.
Incidentally, the lawmakers who are proposing the change, even seem to have realised that it may not come easy. Pwajok who spoke on the matter, was, for instance, quoted to have stated that if the bill was not given assent by the President, the lawmakers, who took the action based on national interest, would invoke constitutional provisions at their disposal to make it see the light of the day.
“Whether it would be assented to or not by the President, as far as we are concerned, remains in the realm of conjuncture for now but if such eventually happens, we will know how to cross the bridge,” he said.
Feelers within APC leadership, also indicate that the party may not be favourably disposed to the new sequence. The fear is that it may see the party losing some of the states currently under its control.
Party chieftains are also having suspicion on why the lawmakers do not want the national election that would see National Assembly and Presidential polls, lumped together as has been the case, even if the ordered is to be tinkered with.
Settling for the new deal
Aside the reasons proffered by NASS Conference Committee for the re-ordered sequence, those in support of the exercise, argue that it would make candidates for election stand on their own. Proponents equally argue that properly managed, the new agenda would ensure fair representation of politicians from different political parties at the state and national assembly, even among the governors.
It is also seen as an effective hedge to the creeping tendency of the country sliding towards a one-party state. With the new arrangement, it is further argued, opposition politics, will once again, thrive, providing ground for checks and balances in governance.
Return to the past
Except the slight modification in the proposal which sees NASS election coming first, the new deal, has a lot in common with the country’s election sequence in the Second Republic and early years of the present dispensation.
Voting in Second Republic had commenced with state elections and the Presidential election coming last.
At the onset of the present civilian order, the country took off with four rounds of elections, between December 1998 and February 1999. These were the local government council elections, which took place on December5, 1998, State House of Assembly and Governorship Elections, on January 9, 1999, National Assembly Elections on February 20, 1999, and the Presidential Election, on February 27, 1999.
Careful management of the sequence and the relative transparency that accompanied the poll, saw the exercise taking place with relative ease.
Enter Olusegun Obasanjo
It was however in the build-up to the 2003 general elections that the then President, Obasanjo changed the order of the elections through the 2001 Electoral Bill.
While in 1999, elections proceeded from the council, state, national assembly and presidential, the 2001 Bill specified that the presidential election would come first.
Many saw the measure as an attempt by Obasanjo and his Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to facilitate a bandwagon effect in subsequent elections. It was also seen as an agenda by Obasanjo to cow the governors.
The current do-or-die political culture in the land, also took roots from the obviously manipulated sequence.
Supporters of the move by the NASS Conference Committee, thus see in the reordered sequence a salutary attempt at restoring sanity in the country’s electoral system.
Nigerians react
Second Vice president of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Monday Ubani, told our reporter that the National Assembly members have every right to reorder the election the way they want.
“Are they not the lawmakers? They are the ones that enact laws. You have elected them to make laws for the good of the country. So if you feel that any law they have made is not okay, you go to court,” he said.
On the essence of the election reordering, he explained: “The only thing is that in making such a law, they should have asked for stakeholders meeting. People should have come forward to contribute. They shouldn’t have done it without having input from members of the public because it is a law that would affect all of us. The input of members of the public should have been sought.
But Constitutional Lawyer and President of Voters Awareness Initiative (VAI), Wale Ogunade, has a contrary view, arguing that the National Assembly lacks the powers to reorder the elections.
According to him, “Section 153 gives INEC the power to organise, moderate and conduct elections. The National Assembly does not have the right to interfere with INEC’s role”.
Ogunade alleged that the action of the lawmakers is not healthy for the polity, adding that, “By virtue of section 4 of the constitution, they have the powers to make laws for the good governance of the country. But this reordering of the elections is for their selfish interest”.
Abdulaziz Ibrahim, a Kaduna based lawyer, toldTheNiche that though he loved the idea of reordering the election, National Assembly lacked the powers to intervene with INEC’s duty.
“If you look at the constitution, it is strictly INEC’s responsibility to fix the election timetable. And the constitution is the grund norm. So, the National Assembly action is contrary to the constitution,” he said.
Head of Politics and International Relations Department, Lead City University Ibadan, Dr. Tunde Oseni, stated that save for the ulterior motive of the lawmakers, there is nothing wrong with reordering the elections.
“The ulterior motive is what we are unable to pin point now. It could be some strategy on the part of the lawmakers to say if we have the presidential election first, it could give the president’s party or supporters of the president some edge.
“You know elections in Nigeria have bandwagon effect whereby once election holds and you know the winner, you don’t bother about subsequent ones because since this is how this election goes, the one that will follow will follow the same pattern.
“I think the National Assembly is trying to play safe and trying to see how some of them can be returned and how the executive influence can be minimized in terms outcomes of subsequent elections,” he said.