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Tag: KOGI

  • Kogi: INEC, AGF and APC leaders erred

    SIR: The controversy generated by the declaration of the Kogi State election as inconclusive and the substitution of late Prince Abubakar Audu with Yahaya Bello has by no means abated.

    Many people have argued that INEC erred by not declaring the winner of the election. Evidently, the election was already won in 16 LGAs by Audu, with total vote of 240,867 as against Captain Wada’s 199,514. Obviously, the valid 25,000 votes in the 91 polling stations cannot change the outcome of a supplementary election.

    Again, that INEC erred by approaching the  Minister of Justice instead of the Supreme Court for interpretation regarding Audu’s demise during  the election; the latter hurriedly  asked APC to replace  late Audu  without due recourse to the constitution.

    The constitution and the electoral laws are strict about who participates and wins an election. After satisfying the requirements of the electoral acts section 31, late Audu picked Faleke and they became inseparable as clearly stated in section 33.  The section makes no room to change or replace a candidate except in the case of sections 141, 142 and 36 (1) where a candidate dies before the commencement of poll. And from there it is agreed that they share the same fate in the outcome of the election. Therefore, replacing Audu with Bello is a grave error.

    The reason for declaring the election inconclusive is flimsy, because when INEC pronounced the election inconclusive, the Audu/Faleke ticekt had clearly won the election. INEC had announced that they polled the highest number of votes of 240,867 against Wada’s 199,514 and won in 16 out of the 21 LGAs.  Sections 133, 134 and especially section 179(1) (a) emphatically states that a contestant can be deemed to have been elected with a majority of YES votes over NO at the election; subsection (b) further stressed that he has not less than one quarter of the votes cast of the election in each of at least two third of all the LGAs. Section 69 of the Electoral Act corroborates that; in an election to the office of the governor, and in compliance with sections 133, 134 and 179, the candidate that receives the highest number of votes shall be declared elected. This answers the question of whether the Audu /Faleke can be deemed to have duly won the election and the election cannot be declared inconclusive.

    Further, section 181(1) of the Electoral Act states that if a person duly elected as governor dies before taking oath of office or for any reason whatsoever cannot be sworn in, the person elected with him as deputy governor shall be sworn in as governor.

    It is therefore an error for INEC and the APC leadership to smuggle Yahaya Bello into a process that was already concluded.

    The only claim of Bello is that he participated at the primary elections where he emerged as a runner-up. The Electoral Act in sections 87 (1) (b) states that the candidate with the highest votes at the end of the voting shall be declared the winner of the primaries. This section of the Electoral Act did not validate runner-ups neither does it suggest warehousing runner up’s votes for any reason. The sole purpose of primary elections is to produce a flag bearer for the party and that ends it.

    Yahaya Bello could have been brought in only before the commencement of polls as stipulated in sections 36 (1) of the constitution. Fortunately for the process, he came late to be considered for any relevance, contesting without a deputy in a needless supplementary where he polled an insignificant 6,855 votes and even when the Electoral Act states that a tribunal or court shall not under any circumstance declare any person winner of an election in which such a person has not fully participated in all the stages of the election.

    From the foregoing, it is incontrovertible that James Faleke is the governor elect. As proceedings unfold in the courts, the rights of the petitioner and electorates must be protected as justice should not be done, but should be seen to be done.

    • Akerejola Abiodun,

     Lokoja, Kogi State.

  • Kogi bites the wrong bullet on inauguration

    Kogi bites the wrong bullet on inauguration

    The headline of this piece is used guardedly in the sense that the ordinary Kogite is understandably not part of the charade of Wednesday’s inauguration of Yahaya Bello as the new Governor of Kogi State. As far as a large faction of the All Progressives Congress (APC) is concerned, both at the national and state levels, it is a pleasant duty to get Alhaji Bello, alias Fairplus, inaugurated as governor. The plot to make him inherit a victory that was not vacant, nor his, was hatched not by the governor-elect himself, but by a handful of men in Abuja who seemed to know more than the rest of Nigeria how the future would look like. Alhaji Bello is merely a pawn; he will remain a pawn until the courts put paid to his pretentiousness.

    But on inauguration day, Wednesday, the new governor will give a speech eulogising democracy and promising the starving and tormented indigenes of the state salvation from want, oppression, mediocrity and stagnation orchestrated by the departing Governor Idris Wada. The new governor will not talk about justice, fairness and equity, nor make any allusion to the distinguishing properties of personal character and integrity. Not being a deep person, nor yet a man of great character, he will be silent on the characteristics of a patriot. Alhaji Bello will muddle through on inauguration day with commonplace triteness and piffle.

    The injustice perpetrated in Kogi State will remain an albatross around the necks of the APC and the electoral body, INEC. INEC did not need to get a brief or advice from the Attorney General. They nonetheless stifled their conscience and embraced the Justice minister’s illogic. A big faction in the APC did not need to play politics with the Kogi election by plotting an electoral stalemate in a display of brazen power play within the party. But they did, for in their opinion, the consequences of the injustice of today  are tolerable to the humiliation and diminution they claim they would suffer should Kogi fall under the wing of someone outside their inner circle.

    After the courts will have done justice and reversed the nonsense hatched in the state in last year’s Kogi governorship election, the APC will still be left with its fratricidal factions, and the wounds caused by the machinations in the party will take a long time to heal. The injury is deep and gangrenous. It is clear that those who thought the APC was the harbinger of a truly national and liberal politics are gravely mistaken. The party has not overcome the bitter, divisive and parochial politics of the past, the kind that undermined previous republics and set one schizoid ethnic group against another. It is to the eternal dishonour of Kogi State that on its land were fired the first shots in the futile war projected to limit the growth, spread and endurance of the APC as a national party, in creed and ideology.

  • Kogi: Tribunal rules on motions against Bello’s inauguration Monday

    Kogi: Tribunal rules on motions against Bello’s inauguration Monday

    The Kogi State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Lokoja has fixed Monday for ruling on two separate motions seeking to stop the inauguration of Alhaji Yahaya Bello as governor on January 27.

    The two motions seeking an order of the tribunal to stop the inauguration were filed by counsel to Governor Idris Wada and PDP, Chief Chris Uche (SAN) and that of Labour Party, Reuben Egwuaba.

    The Chairman of the tribunal, Justice Halima Mohammed, fixed the date after listening to submissions and adoption of written addresses of the counsel to the two parties yesterday.

    Uche said his motion on notice dated January 12 and filed on January 13 was supported by a 44-paragraph affidavit and 10 grounds

    In his own motion on notice, Egwuaba had averred that Bello was not qualified to participate in the supplementary election when he did.

    He said apart from his failure to participate in all the electoral processes preparatory to the governorship election, Bello breached the Electoral Act (2010) as amended, as he contested the supplementary election without a valid running mate.

    “Consequent upon nomination of Alhaji Yahaya Bello as replacement for Abubakar Audu, Hon. James Faleke, who was Audu’s running mate, withdrew and dissociated himself from participating in supplementary election as Bello’s running mate,” he argued.

    Joseph Daudu (SAN), counsel to the governor-elect, opposed the motion in his submission, strengthened by a 31-paragraph counter affidavit.

    He urged the tribunal to dismiss the motion on the ground that the tribunal was not constitutionally empowered to stop the swearing-in of a governor-elect.

    Counsel to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Dr Alex Izinyon (SAN) and the All Progressives Congress (APC), Charles Edosomwan (SAN) also opposed the motion in their submissions.

  • Kogi and history

    Kogi and history

    History is irrepressible. She is impossible to cage. Bury history a million times. She springs back to life each time ever more vibrant and resilient. With the collapse of communism in the late 1980s, Eurocentric intellectuals like the brilliant political scientist, Francis Fukuyama, in his book, ‘The End of History and the Last Man’ imperiously pronounced the end of history. History laughed derisorily at such palpable ignorance. She has since resurrected with a fury in the form of civilizational, culture and religious clashes, particularly the horrendous spectre of extreme Islamic terrorism, that have since replaced the comparatively tamer and far saner super-power ideological clashes of the cold war years.

    For inexplicable reasons, the mysterious masters of the Nigerian universe decided to banish history from primary and secondary school curricula in the country. Were they afraid of their own shadows? Was this a subliminal fear of the power of history to record their atrocities in indelible ink on the unalterable pages of time for the perusal and contemplation of generations yet unborn? No matter. History like the genie last Friday, January 15, escaped from the bottle and has been on rampage. That day marked the 50th anniversary of the invasion of Nigeria’s political space by Professor Samuel Finer’s fabled ‘men on horseback’ signalling the loss of the country’s political innocence.

    Barred from schools, history erupted in beer parlours, pepper soup joints, newsrooms, board rooms, commercial buses, newspaper vendor stands and sundry other places. Many columnists and analysts lampooned the hot headed masterminds of the January 15, 1966 coup – Majors Kaduna Nzeogwu, Emmanuel Ifeajuna, D. Okafor, C.I. Anuforo and Wale Ademoyega. They have been variously described pejoratively as unrealistically idealistic and naïve. Some deride them as simplistic. Others assail them as inept in the execution of the coup. Some excoriate the seeming bloodthirstiness that saw the savage slaughtering of key political and military leaders principally from the North and the West. They have been blamed for rupturing the country’s democracy and setting the stage for the country’s descent to anarchy and civil war.

    I think this is entirely wrong- headed. What happened on January 15, 1966, was only the whirlwind. Those who sowed the wind were the rabidly anti-democratic elements that raped the country’s constitution with impunity, violated the rule of law and enthroned a reign of impunity. Yes, democracy in the first republic was buried on January 15, 1966. However, it had died much earlier. The first republic and constitutional rule were effectively guillotined on May 29, 1962, when the Northern People’s Congress (NPC) and National Council of Nigerian Citizens (NCNC) coalition government at the centre unwarrantedly and illegally declared a state of emergency in Western Nigeria and effectively took over the Action Group (AG)-controlled government of the region. This was in reality the first coup in the history of Nigeria executed, ironically, by civilians who were apparently following the due process of law to perpetrate blatant illegalities.

    Capitalising on the intra- party crisis within the Action Group, the leaders of the NPC and NCNC in collaboration with the treacherous Premier of the Western region, Chief S. Ladoke Akintola, saw it as a golden opportunity to break the hold of a supposedly rigid and stubborn Awolowo and his party in the west. It did not matter to them that Awolowo remained the hero of the masses of the west. No, Awo was not born great. He did not have greatness thrust upon him on a platter of gold. Indeed, Azikiwe and his NCNC enjoyed considerable popularity and electoral support in many parts of a liberal western Nigeria including Lagos giving the AG stiff competition in the area. It was Awolowo’s superlative performance, first as Leader of Government Business and then Premier of Western Nigeria between 1952 and 1959 that decisively changed the political tide in his favour in the region.

    The crisis between Akintola and the leader of his party, Awolowo, degenerated irreparably. Chief Bola Ige gives a vivid account of the crisis in his book, ‘People, Politics and Politicians of Nigeria (1940-1979)’. On 19 May, 1962, Akintola was charged and tried for anti-party activities by the Federal Executive Council of his party. The trial lasted six hours. At the end of the day, he tendered an apology and gave an assurance to relinquish his office if there was a recurrence. That evening, however, he quit the AG with his supporters and announced the formation of a new party – the United People’s Party (UPP). He was consequently expelled from the party.

    Satisfied that a majority of the members of the region’s House of Assembly had lost confidence in Akintola, the governor of the West, Sir Adesoji Aderemi, the Ooni of Ife, exercised his constitutional powers by removing him from office as Premier and appointing Alhaji D.S. Adegbenro as his replacement. Akintola was recalcitrant. He rejected his removal from office arguing that this could only be done by a vote of no confidence in parliament. Yet, knowing that he did not have the requisite support to survive as Premier, he refused to convene a meeting of the House.

    Alhaji Adegbenro thus convened a meeting of the House for May 29, 1962. The task before the House was simple: affirm support either for Akintola or Adegbenro as Premier. Akintola and his minority of supporters attended the sitting but with an agenda to disrupt the proceedings. They broke the mace, jumped on tables and caused pandemonium. Rather, than restore order so that the House could sit peacefully, men of the Nigeria Police, acting on the instruction of Alhaji Tafawa Balewa, shot tear gas into the chamber, dispersed members and locked up the House.

    Claiming that law and order had broken down in the region, Balewa thereafter declared a state of emergency in the West, removed the constitutional government and appointed his Minister of Health, Dr Koye Majekodunmi, as Administrator. This was despite the fact that there was peace and calm throughout the region. It was a swift and ruthless takeover of the west – the first successful coup in Nigeria. Of course, one act of impunity needs a succession of even more brazen acts of lawlessness to be sustained. In the course of time, Awolowo and his key supporters would be serving prison terms for farcical and comical allegations of treasonable felony and Akintola was back in power as Premier of the West – courtesy of his federal friends and supposed ‘conquerors’ of Yorubaland.

    Matters came to a head in 1965 when the regional elections in the West were blatantly rigged to keep Akintola and his Nigerian National Democratic Party (NNDP) in power at all cost despite being deeply detested by the vast majority of the people. Akintola’s deputy, Chief Remi Fani-Kayode, openly boasted that the NNDP would win the elections whether or not the people voted for them and that is exactly what happened. Of course, the proud people of the West would have none of such barefaced injustice. The region descended into anarchy.  Amazingly, when Balewa was told that the West was burning, he calmly replied that he could see no flames! That is the kind of arrogance and impunity that set the stage for the tragic events of January 15, 1966. Serve impunity diligently all your life and your pension is death!

    Recounting history just to excite and titillate is nothing but a futile exercise in intellectual masturbation. The crucial thing is to learn the appropriate lessons at the feet of erudite ‘Professor History’ so that past disasters do not mutate into even more devastating future catastrophes. On Wednesday, January 27, the tenure of the incumbent governor of Kogi State, Captain Idris Wada, expires. What should ordinarily be a smooth transition to a new democratically elected government in the state is being turned into a veritable fiasco with dire implications for our democracy by an Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) with increasingly blighted professional and moral integrity since the exit of its immediate past chairman, Professor Attahiru Jega.

    The good people of Kogi State went to the polls on November 21, 2015, to elect a new governor to pilot their affairs for another four years. They cast 240,867 votes for the APC TICKET of Prince Audu Abubakar and Honourable James Abiodun Falake and 199,415 votes for the PDP TICKET of Captain Idris Wada and Architect Yomi Awoniyi. It was a decisive and CONCLUSIVE victory for the APC ticket. They won the highest number of votes and had the requisite Local Government spread as stipulated by the constitution and the Electoral Act.

    Before the results were announced, the APC candidate, Prince Abubakar Audu, died. It is precisely for unforeseen occurrences like this that presidential and governorship candidates are constitutionally mandated to have running mates. For some inexplicable reason, INEC declared the election inconclusive and on December 5, 2015, held so called ‘supplementary elections’in 91 polling units across the states.

    Curiously, on the advice of the Attorney General of the Federation (AGF), Mr Abubakar Malami (SAN), an interested partisan party, INEC allowed the APC to substitute the late Audu with Alhaji Yahaya Bello who came second in the APC primaries. Unlike James Faleke, Audu’s running mate, Bello is completely alien to the election of November 21, 2015, on which the supplementary election stands. The Electoral Act, legal pundits point out, does not give room for substitution of candidates AFTER elections have been held – this can be done only before the polls.

    Bello went into the supplementary election without a running mate since Faleke openly declined to play that role contending that he should rightly be declared duly elected as governor of the state. This is another patent illegality. Unless Faleke changes his mind and accepts to be his deputy, Bello cannot come up with a constitutionally valid deputy unless further acts of impunity are perpetrated.

    As it were, Yahaya Bello has added absolutely no value to the APC in the election. Remove the 13,000 votes recorded in the supplementary election in which he participated and the result of the November 21, 2015, polls still stands clear, conclusive and inviolate. That election needs no crutches. We may need more impunity to consolidate the present impunity in Kogi. But let us be wary of impunity. It will always demand its wages in full and democracy is always the ultimate casualty.

  • As new administration takes over in Kogi

    SIR: Yahaya Bello is set to take over the mantle of leadership as the sixth democratically elected governor of Kogi State at a time when the state’s share of revenue accruable from the federation account is nose diving.

    Considering the prevailing economic realities coupled with the urgent need to rescue our people from the shackles of poverty and hunger, the exigency of the moment demands that the incoming administration looks inward for funds to better the lots of our people. Ours is a civil service state with over 75% of the working population being under the employment of the state and local government. This means that a lion share of the state’s resources is being channeled into payment of workers’ salaries, pension and gratuity, and other allowances. The honest truth is that no state can thrive or performs optimally when majority of its resource is used in paying salaries and allowances.

    As it currently stands, the Internally Generated Revenue IGR of the state is nothing to write home about, I am an advocate of the fact that state has no business waiting for monthly allocations from the federation account before workers’ salaries are paid. As a matter of fact, I fully support the proposition that any state whose IGR can’t pay salaries of its workforce should cease to exist as a state or rather be merged with another to make it more viable.

    Available records and statistics shows that only Lagos and Kano states can conveniently pay its workers from their IGR with not having to wait on monthly federal allocations from Abuja. The need for Kogi State to put machinery in motion at speedily increasing the state’s IGR is a task which the incoming administration should embark on as a matter of priority. Moving Kogi State from its present status of a civil service state into an industrialized one that would ensure creation of ample jobs, for our teaming unemployed youth and curb the prevailing hunger, poverty and restiveness as promised by the APC during the gubernatorial campaigns can only come to fruitions through an improved IGR.

    The fact that Lagos state has been able to boost its IGR base through effective collection and prompt remission of taxes into the state’s account is no longer news. The new administration should borrow from the expertise of tax administrators and workers of its Lagos State counterpart. Training and retraining of staff of the Kogi State Revenue Service by either inviting experts from Lagos to come and train ours or sponsoring staff to Lagos to be trained is highly indicated and needed at this moment if Kogi is to benefit and learn from the “magic” of Lagos State as far of as taxes collection and remission of revenues are concerned.

    The greatest asset of any state is its people i.e. its human resources. Luckily, Kogi State is well blessed and endowed with brilliant, agile, enterprising and a hardworking people which if effectively put to use and harnessed can turn the revenue base of the state around. The time for us to de-emphasize reliance on oil money from Abuja is now. God has already blessed the confluence state with abundant mineral resources which if prudently tapped has the capacity to replace crude oil and make Kogi one of the richest states in the federation.

    Ghost-worker-syndrome which has been a conduit pipe through which the state’s meager resource is being milked by corrupt individuals should be carefully tackled through a well programmed and comprehensive staff audit or workers biometric registration. This will ensure that only people who are genuinely under the employment of government get paid and further blocked leakages. Previous administrations since creation of the state have treated the issue of pension and gratuity with levity, leaving our senior citizens who have served the state in their youth days to suffer unduly and languish in penury, the prevailing condition where some state pensioners still earns as meager as N5000 monthly should be looked into and reviewed upward as a matter of priority.

     

    • Hussain Obaro,

    Lokoja, Kogi State.

  • Kogi: Inaugurating Bello as governor’ll be unconstitutional

    Kogi: Inaugurating Bello as governor’ll be unconstitutional

    The tenancy of Kogi State Governor Idris Wada at the Lugard House, Lokoja will end in seven days. But, Olarinde Yesufu, a legal analyst with The Nation, says Yahaya Bello, who is taking the mantle of leadership, is a stranger and an interloper

    In a few days from now, the tenure of Captain Idris Wada, Governor of Kogi State, will come to an end. By effluxion of time and in line with the provision of Section 180(2) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended), he shall vacate his office as governor of Kogi State on January 27.

    One distinguishing feature of democracy as a form of government is the platform it provides to render those who govern accountable to the electorate. Accountability in this sense is secured through regular elections. The head of government is elected by popular votes. He is invested with authority and power in order that he may try to achieve those goals which he commits himself to the people. At the end of his term of office, the electorate has the opportunity to judge his performance and re-elect him or dismiss him from office through voting. It follows that the will of the people, expressed through credible electoral process, forms the substratum of authority and legitimacy of democratic governments.

    On November 21, 2015, the electorate in Kogi State exercised their franchise, spoke through the power of their thumbs and roundly rejected Captain Idris Wada, who is adjudged a non-performer from continuing as the governor of the state. His power of incumbency could not deliver him from outright rejection. At the election, the All Progressives Congress (APC) featured Prince Abubakar Audu and Hon. James Abiodun Faleke as its governorship and deputy governorship candidates respectively. Similarly, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), featured Captain Idris Wada and Arc. Yomi Awoniyi. Twenty other political parties participated in the election.

    The electorate in Kogi overwhelmingly voted Prince Abubakar Audu/Faleke in an election that has been acknowledged as generally peaceful, free and fair. Unfortunately, tragedy struck, as the cold hands of death caught up with Prince Audu. He died shortly after the conclusion of the election. Since the demise of Prince Audu, things have not remained the same in the political arena of Kogi State. What started as a simple and straightforward issue has been made unnecessarily complicated by the sheer ineptitude of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). Surely, INEC must bear the brunt of the blame of the crisis in Kogi that has arisen as a result of Prince Audu’s death. As the constitutional body set up to organize credible elections in Nigeria, the bulk stops at the table of INEC. In the performance of its sacred responsibility, it owes Nigerians, (Kogites inclusive), the duty of independence and competence, which must be demonstrated transparently. What we are witnessing in Kogi State, regrettably, falls short of this expectation. The general impression is that we now have an INEC that is spineless and lacking in capacity; an INEC that is manipulatable and has indeed, within a short time of its new leadership, lent itself to political manipulations at the expense of the constitution of the Federal Republic, the Grundnorm. The way INEC mishandled Audu’s death is unfortunate. The dubious and insincere approach it adopted in ‘resolving’ the issue has engendered political and constitutional imbroglio of a frightening proportion in the state. As the date for inauguration of a new government approaches, an atmosphere of fear, tension and anxiety has enveloped the entire state. Series of applications are now pending before the Kogi State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal, Lokoja, seeking to stop the inauguration of Alhaji Yahaya Bello as governor. The first misstep of INEC in declaring the election of November 21, 2015 inconclusive has led it to commit one error after another, such that, a spectacle of comedy of errors is now created, with Kogi State, nay, Nigeria, becoming an object of ridicule in the eyes of the civilised world. A review of these errors is apposite at this point.

    Wrong declaration of election of November 21, 2015 as inconclusive

    INEC has a statutory duty to declare winners at elections it organises. Section 69 of the Electoral Act (2010) imposes this duty. It provides:

    1. In an election to the office of the President or Governor, whether contested or not contested, and in any contested election to any other elective office, the result shall be ascertained by counting the votes for each candidate and subject to the provisions of section 133, 134 and 179 of the Constitution, the candidate that receives the highest number of votes shall be declared elected by the appropriate Returning Officer.

    It is important to note here that Sections 133 and 134 of the Constitution, referred to above, apply to election of the president, while section 179 applies to governorship election. The applicable provision in respect of a governorship election is section 179(2) of the Constitution. For purposes of clarity, it is quoted hereunder:

    179(2). A candidate for an election to the office of governor of a state shall be deemed to have been duly elected where, there being two or more candidates —

    • He has the highest number of votes cast at the election; and
    • He has not less than one-quarter of all the votes cast at each of at least two-thirds of all the local government areas in the state.

    The undisputed scores announced and declared by the Returning Officer of Kogi State governorship election shows that Prince Abubakar Audu and Hon. James Faleke polled 240,867 votes and Captain Idris Wada and Yomi Awoniyi scored 199,514 votes. There was a margin of 41,353 votes between them. With these scores duly recorded, announced and declared by the returning officer, the operation of sections 69 of the Electoral Act and 179(2) of the Constitution comes into effect. Accordingly, the returning officer ought to have performed its constitutional responsibility by announcing Prince Audu and Hon. Faleke winners. At the point when the returning officer ought to do this, he, incomprehensibly, declared the election “inconclusive”. He then went ahead to fix a date for a ‘supplementary’ election in 91 polling units around the state. The position of INEC was that votes of some 49,000 registered voters were pending and it was still possible for the outstanding votes to have effect on the overall result.

    INEC was not truthful on this point. INEC knew that a supplementary election was unnecessary in the circumstances. The electoral body was and is still in possession of records which show that in the affected 91 polling units, there were only 38,000 permanent voters cards (PVCs) issued. From the said 38,000 PVCs, only 25,000 voters collected the cards. And, at the November 21, 2015 election, only 19,000 persons were accredited in the affected units. The margin of win by Audu/Faleke ticket would, undoubtedly, have accommodated any of the figures with Audu/Faleke still leading by majority of votes. It can, therefore, be rightly concluded that the phony ‘supplementary’ election was falsely devised to hoodwink the people of Kogi State and play the script of some powerful political interests at the expense of the will of the people of Kogi freely expressed.

    Was the election

    conclusive or inconclusive?

    The verdict of INEC that the November 21, 2015 election was inconclusive is baffling. It is a grave error. INEC and its officials at the end of the election announced the results of all the polling units, wards and local government areas in Kogi State. The returning officer of the election has also declared the overall scores of the candidates.  It is, therefore, incongruous that an electoral body would announce all the results of the local governments of a state and turn around to declare same inconclusive. If INEC knew what it was doing, it should have demonstrated the ‘inconclusiveness’ of the election by leaving out unannounced, the results of the units, wards and local government areas where votes were outstanding.

    The well-established principle of electoral law presumes the result declared by INEC as correct and authentic. INEC is, accordingly, bound by the result of Kogi State governorship election announced and declared by its returning officer on November 22, 2015. (See: Buhari v. Obasanjo (2005) 13 NWLR (Pt. 941)1.  The onus is now on the electoral body to establish that the 13,000 votes cast at its phony ‘supplementary’ election has any effect on the declared result. In so far as the 13,000 votes cannot tilt the scale of victory, one way or the other, it becomes irresistible to conclude that the election was conclusive on November 21, 2015, contrary to the claim or assertion of INEC.

    Prince Audu’s replacement and Bello’s emergence

    It was under the guise of the “supplementary” election conducted by INEC on December 5, 2015, that Alhaji Yahaya Bello emerged as the APC candidate. INEC had earlier requested APC to replace the late Prince Audu and the party forwarded his name. At the end of the ‘supplementary’ election, Alhaji Bello scored 6,000 votes and was curiously declared winner and governor-elect of Kogi State. This declaration is surely without any constitutional foundation a fortiori after discovering that all the votes cast at the “supplementary” election amounted to only 13,000 which if added to the existing scores still put Audu/Faleke ticket at the forefront and winner of the election.

    The root of the substitution of the late Prince Abubakar Audu with Alhaji Yahaya Bello can be traced to the gratuitous advice offered by the Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF), Mr. Abubakar Malami, directing INEC to allow APC to substitute its deceased candidate.  INEC keyed into the counsel and fell into error. In a way, the AGF misled INEC to arrive at an unconstitutional decision.

     It was clearly not part of the responsibilities of the AGF to offer legal advice to INEC or any directive for that matter. INEC has its own consortium of Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SAN) that provide counsel to the commission and defend its cases. INEC also has a very vibrant legal services department, headed by another SAN. It is not unlikely that INEC lawyers offered their professional advice to INEC which must have been ignored on an altar of political expediency.

     The theory of substitution of a candidate after the conclusion of an election propounded or advocated by Malami and enforced by INEC is strange to our electoral law and the constitution. The fact is well established that Prince Audu did not die before or during the November 21, 2015 election. He died after the election. The evidence for this assertion is not far-fetched. He was seen in the full glare of television cameras as he cast his vote on that day. He also made some remarks over the conduct of the election. INEC also buttressed this fact when it widely published a statement that it officially got to know about Prince Audu’s death on November 23, 2015.

    The notion of substitution of candidates is a pre-election and not a post-election matter. The event of Prince Audu’s death is a post and not a pre-election matter. The right of a political party to substitute a candidate abates before the commencement of an election. Section 36 of the Electoral Act is explicit on this as it states:

    “If after the time for the delivery of nomination paper and before the commencement of the poll, a nominated candidates dies, the Chief National Electoral Commissioner shall, being satisfied of the fact of the death, countermand the poll in which the deceased candidate was to participate and the commission shall appoint some other convenient day for the election within 14 days.

    From the foregoing since Prince Audu died after the election of November 21, 2015, it was wrong for APC and INEC to have substituted him with Alhaji Bello. There is no known law or constitutional provision that allows for the substitution of a candidate after the commencement or conclusion of an election. The APC clearly over-exaggerated its powers and ascribed to itself the authority it does not possess in arbitrarily, illegally and unconstitutionally by-passing Hon. James Abiodun Faleke and picking Alhaji Yahaya Bello to substitute Prince Audu in a most undemocratic and crude manner.

    If for the purposes of arguments, it is agreed (not conceded) that a supplementary election was necessary in the circumstances of Kogi election, APC committed an unpardonable blunder by not presenting Hon. James Abiodun Faleke as its governorship candidate after the death of Prince Audu. It is inconceivable that APC and INEC could not appreciate that in the election of November 21, 2015, there was the joint ticket of Audu/Faleke and APC. The votes cast at the election were for the trio. None of the three can take anyone in the ticket for granted. None of them can trade away the votes. And, because the votes are indivisible, they are also not transferable. Accordingly, Alhaji Yahaya Bello, for all practical, legal and constitutional purposes, is a stranger and an interloper to the 240,867 votes scored by Audu/Faleke and APC ticket on November 21, 2015. It is important to stress, for the umpteenth time, that the Kogi State governorship election held on that day was won upon those scores unequivocally and without any quibbling.

    The pungent point has to be made, by way of education, for the benefit of INEC and APC that the era in which votes were said to be won by political parties has gone. Political parties are inanimate entities that can neither canvass for nor win votes on their own. In recent times, the Supreme Court has handed down decisions that over-ruled its earlier decision in Amaechi v. INEC (2008) 5 NWLR (Pt 1080) 227. The current position as adumbrated in CPC & Anor v. Ombugadu & Anor (2013) LPEL-21007 (SC), by the apex court is that: “Contrary to the decision of this Court in Amaechi’s case, the implication of section 141 of the Electoral Act, 2010 (as amended) is that while a candidate at an election must be sponsored by a political party, the candidate who stands to win or lose the election is the candidate and not the political party that sponsored him. In other words, parties do not contest, win or lose election directly; they do so by the candidates they sponsored”. (P. 51).See also Jev. & Anor v. Iyortom& Ors (2014) LEPELR-23000. Furthermore, it is noteworthy that these two cases also establish the principle that before a person can be returned as elected, that person must have fully participated in all the stages of the election.

    Simon Achuba as

    deputy-governor elect?

    The comedy of errors in Kogi has now been carried to a point of unmitigated absurdity, with the surreptitious approval of Hon. Simon Achuba as deputy governor-elect of Kogi State. This is simply scandalous! The criminal act which must necessarily involve some elements of forgery and falsification raises some fundamental questions.

    • In which election did Achuba participate?
    • When did he complete his nomination form?
    • Has the position of deputy-governor of Kogi State become so cheap that it can be picked by the road side or at a market?
    • When was Achuba announced to have won any election along with anybody?
    • Since this is a post-election matter, the House Assembly of the State is required to approve such a nomination or selection. When did the House approve same?

    Conclusion

    There is no doubt, if INEC had approached and handled the election in Kogi State with sincerity of purpose and astuteness required of an independent and unbiased umpire, as INEC is established to be, Hon. James Abiodun Faleke should by now have been warming up for his inauguration as the governor-elect to take over from the non-performing Wada, in accordance with the mandate that the electorate of Kogi State gave to Audu/Faleke and APC ticket. This is in consonance with the combined effect of the provisions of sections 179 (2) and 181 (1) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

    The way out, therefore, is the path of constitutionality. The path of constitutionality is the path that guarantees peace, equity and justice. It is the only path that will strengthen our nascent democracy and rekindle the faith of Nigerians and the world at large, that democracy can work in this country.

    Any step taken outside the path of constitutionality can neither last nor stand. The path of constitutionality is a path that demands courage and strength of character. May the Almighty God grant the judiciary the courage and strength needed to do justice at these trying times, to save Kogi from underserved disparagement and mockery.

  • Kogi senator wins APC ticket for rerun

    The All Progressives Congress (APC) Senator for Kogi East District, Abdulrahman Abubakar, who was sacked by the appeal tribunal has won his party’s ticket to contest the rerun election.

    Abubakar was sacked over allegation that he did not win the party’s ticket through primaries.

    He polled 1,182 votes to defeat his closest rival, Hajia Halima Alfa, who scored 383 at the APC primary conducted at the main bowl of Achema Stadium, Idah.

    Abubakar’s election boosted the popularity of the Audu/Faleke political organisation.

    Both Abubakar and Alfa belong to different political camps within the APC. While Senator Abubakar belongs to the Audu / Faleke political family, Alfa is the Yahaya Bello group.

    Reacting to Abubakar,s victory, Alhaji Mohammed Audu, eldest son of Prince Abubakar Audu said it was victory well deserved from delegates who have vowed to remain loyal to the  cause of Audu/Faleke political family.

    “ We are grateful to our very loyal delegates who refused to betray the trust reposed in them. We are grateful to the Almighty  Allah who is the pillar of support of our political family. This is clear signal that the Audu / Faleke political family is still very much alive, United and focused”, he ascerted.

    The APC in Kogi State had split into two camps after INEC declared the November 21, 2015 Governorship election in Kogi State inconclusive. Things got messier following the death of the party,s candidate in the election, Audu and INEC calling for a replacement. The APC leadership in a bizarre decision opted to pick Bello instead of Hon James Faleke, Audu’s Deputy.

    However, Faleke  cried foul insisting that the Audu / Faleke ticket indeed won the November 21, 2015 election having scored the highest numbers of votes and fulfilled all constitutional requirements.  He has since filed a case at the Election Tribunal sitting in Lokoja to reclaim the Audu / Faleke mandate.

  • APC to Kogi Assembly: we’ve no hand in your crisis

    The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Kogi State said yesterday that it had nothing to do with the leadership crisis in the House of Assembly.

    It said its preoccupation was to put in place a dynamic administration after the inauguration of Governor-elect Yahaya Bello.

    The Chairman, Alhaji Haddy Ametuo, said in a statement in Abuja that those linking the party with the leadership crisis were detractors.

    Said he: “As far as we are concerned, we have no interest or hand in the crisis in the House of Assembly. After all, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) even has the majority. Our detractors should not link us with their actions or inactions.

    “Instead of linking Governor-elect Bello to their inability to manage the House, we urge them to look inwards and search their ‘cupboards’.”

    Ametuo cautioned the Central Senatorial District people against ‘over-celebration’, saying the task ahead was enormous.

    He said on the inauguration day, thuggery and unnecessary celebration by masqueraders would not be allowed.

    “I enjoin the people to be law-abiding. Security operatives will be on the alert to arrest troublemakers. We must comport ourselves.”

  • Kogi, Bayelsa polls: INEC’s inconsistencies foster electoral conundrums

    Kogi, Bayelsa polls: INEC’s inconsistencies foster electoral conundrums

    To OLARINDE YESUFU, a legal analyst with The Nation, applying different rules in deciding the governorship elections in Kogi and Bayelsa states amounts to double standard on the part of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). In this analysis, Yesufu says INEC’s inconsistencies have triggered electoral puzzles difficult to unravel.

    On November 21, 2015, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) conducted the Kogi State governorship election. At the end of the exercise, it (INEC) declared the election inconclusive. According to the results declared by the Returning Officer, Prof Emmanuel Kucha, Vice Chancellor, University of Markurdi, Prince Abubakar Audu of the All Progressive Congress (APC) scored 240,867 votes while Idris Wada of the People’s Democratic Party scored 199,514 votes. Prof Kucha said the margin of votes between Messrs Audu and Wada was 41,353; and the election was inconclusive because the number of registered voters in 91 polling units in 18 local government areas where election was cancelled was 49,953. That figure, according to the learned professor, was higher than the 41,353 votes with which Prince Audu was ahead of Mr. Wada. The returning officer further said that by INEC guidelines, no return could be made for the election until a supplementary election was held in the areas where election was cancelled. It is significant to note that Prof Kachu based his decision on INEC guidelines and not on any section of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

    The Nigerian Constitutionhas prescribed the conditions to be satisfied in order to win a Governorship election. For the avoidance of doubts, section 179 (2) thereof provides:

    179(2). A candidate for an election to the Office of Governor of a state shall be deemed to have been duly elected where there being two or more candidates –

    (a)        he has the highest number of votes cast at the election and

    (b)       he has not less one-quarter the votes cast in each of at least two-thirds of all the local government areas in the state.

    Before the official announcement of the results of the election, many media establishments monitoring the election had declared Prince Abubakar Audu winner of the election. And, on the basis of the final results announced by the returning officer, it became clear that Prince Abubakar Audu already satisfied the conditions stipulated under Section 179(2) of the Constitution. As at the time the returning officer announced the final results and declaration that the election was inconclusive, there was no indication that Prince Audu was dead. In any event, he never mentioned Prince Audu’s death as any reason for the inconclusiveness of the election. Nevertheless, for some inexplicable reasons, it was convenient for the returning officer to close his eyes to the extant provisions of the Constitution and follow INEC guidelines. The consequence of INEC’s decision is the mess into which Kogi State has been thrown. This has been rightly described in some quarters as political and constitutional conundrum. Now, virtually all the political parties that participated in the election, including those that won only 1,000 votes have made their ways to the election tribunal to challenge the thoughtless pronouncement of the returning officer.

    Two weeks after the Kogi election, the Bayelsa election held. It was as keenly contested as Kogi’s. In both states, two ex-governors slugged it out with the incumbents. In Bayelsa, incumbent Governor Seriake Dickson contested on the platform of PDP while the APC featured former governor Timipre Sylva.

    The fate of the first round of election in Bayelsa was the same as Kogi. At the close of the election, the State Resident Electoral Commissioner, Mr. Baritor Kpagih, cancelled the poll in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area because of violence, excess voting, ballot-snatching and hostage-taking of the officials. Again, a return could not be made because, there was a margin of 33,154 margin of win by Dickson over the runner-up, Sylva. The votes of some 120,827 registered voters in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area were outstanding.

    One clear distinction between the inconclusive elections of Kogi and Bayelsa was that, in respect of Kogi, the results of all the polling units, wards and local government areas were announced, none was outstanding. Even the results of the wards and local government areas of the 91 polling units where supplementary election was slated to hold had been accepted and announced by the returning officer. The local government areas won by Prince Audu were: Ofu, Idah, Kabba/Bunu, Yagba East, Yagba West, Adavi, Kotonkarfe, Ankpa, Okehi, Ajaokuta, Ijumu, Olamaboro, Igalamela, Bassa, Lokoja and Ibaji. Governor Wada was victorious in only five local government areas, namely; Ogori-Magongo, Omala, Okene, Dekina and Mopa-Amuro. The foregoing, on its own, suggested to many people that the election in the state was duly concluded, contrary to the declaration of INEC. The purported supplementary election could therefore be rightly considered unnecessary, needless, wasteful, superfluous and gratuitous.

    As regards the Bayelsa election, the result of Southern Ijaw Local Government Area was not announced and could, indeed, be rightly considered inconclusive. Consequently, not much noise was associated with the decision of INEC to hold a supplementary election in Bayelsa State.

    There is no doubt that the demise of Prince Abubakar Audu was shocking. The decision of INEC to declare the election of Kogi inconclusive undoubtedly complicated the already complex situation. The real point of controversy now is whether or not INEC should have declared the election inconclusive after announcing the results of all the local government areas. It may also be asked: should INEC have ordered fresh elections in the affected 91 polling units? It should be recalled here that from the available records, only 38,000 registered voters had Permanent Voter Cards (PVC) in the 91 polling units out of which only 19,000 were accredited. These facts were not disputed by INEC. It follows that if 19,000 votes were added to Wada’s votes, such votes could not have altered the results of the election in Kogi. The result would still have been in favour of Prince Audu. Nevertheless, INEC insisted in holding a supplementary election in the state. At the end, less than 13,000 persons voted with Yahaya Bello, whom APC used to substitute Abubakar Audu, scoring only 6,000 votes.

    Now, the Bayelsa supplementary election held on Saturday, January 9. The candidate of PDP, Mr. Seriake Dickson polled 134,998 votes to emerge the winner. APC candidate, Mr. Timipre Sylva scored 86,852. A total number of 53,000 votes were said to have been cancelled, while the difference between Dickson and APC is 48,000. In other words, cancelled votes exceeded the difference between the winner and the runner-up. Notwithstanding this fact, INEC proceeded to announce a winner!

    What happened in Bayelsa State has exposed the lies and hypocrisy of INEC. It demonstrates clearly that the decision of INEC on Kogi must have been a product of some political undercurrent or the lack of capacity of INEC. Indeed, Bayelsa’s case has now prompted reasonable men to ask questions.

    * Why did INEC declare the election of Kogi State inconclusive when the results of all the local government areas in the State had been announced by the returning officer and one of the contestants had fulfilled the conditions stipulated under Section 179(2) of the Constitution?

    * Why did INEC insist in holding supplementary election in Kogi when the number of accredited voters or holders of PVCs fell for below the difference between the two leading candidates?

    * Why did INEC not conduct another supplementary election in Bayelsa when it found that the number of cancelled votes exceeded the difference between Dickson (the winner) and Sylva (the loser)?

    * Is it still not possible that the pendulum of victory in Bayelsa’s election swings in favour of Sylva?

    These and many other questions beg for answers and agitate the minds of an objective observer. We may never get answers to these questions from INEC. Hopefully, the tribunals will be up to the task to unravel the mysteries.

  • Civil Defence arrests 130 in Kogi

    Civil Defence arrests 130 in Kogi

    •19 arraigned

    The Kogi State Command of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) arrested 130 suspects for vandalism and theft last year.

    The Commandant, Mr. Ochogwu Michael, yesterday in Lokoja at a review of the command’s activities last year, said it protected national assets and infrastructures, adding that of the suspects apprehended, 19 were arraigned, out of which four cases were concluded and 15 were pending.

    He said the exhibits recovered included illegal petroleum products, vehicles, pumping machines, communication cables and drums, stressing that transformer vandalism, which characterised the first quarter of last year, had reduced.

    According to him, surveillance and patrol of power installations helped the command to achieve result.