The Nation Newspaper

Tag: umpire

  • Overwhelmed umpire

    •Government should remove legislative encumbrances to effective prosecution of electoral offenders

    Impunity has over the years been identified as the bane of conducting free, fair and credible elections in Nigeria. Members of the party in power and other public office holders are known to trample on the law with impunity.

    While the electoral commission continues to make efforts to improve on its act, introducing top-of–the-range technology for accreditation and conduct of elections, infringements such as ballot box snatching, shooting in the air, murder and arson have continued unabated. Unfortunately, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has failed to prosecute and secure conviction of the offenders.

    There are, it has been pointed out, 419 cases flowing from the 2015 general elections alone awaiting prosecution and trial. This will take the combined efforts of the judiciary, police and other security forces, as well as INEC to quickly do away with even as other elections are due soon. Anambra State governorship election is barely a fortnight away, with the Ekiti and Osun governorship polls also due next year.

    Unless INEC is supported by all to bring electoral offenders to book, they will continue with impunity to trample on the right of others. Political corruption is the worst form of corruption. When politicians steal party mandate, or employ the services of rough necks to upturn the will of the people, or worse still, collude with electoral officials to forge results, they promote brigandage, loss of faith in the electoral system and, ultimately imminent breakdown of law and order.

    We call on the three arms of government to rein in political offenders. All outstanding cases from previous elections should be given accelerated hearing. The legislators should, as part of the on-going review of the constitution, quickly give heed to INEC’s call for establishment of an Electoral Offences Commission.

    The electoral umpire has cried out that it lacks the capacity to handle prosecution of the cases. It contends that making it handle the cases would amount to undue distraction from its primary duty of preparing for elections. This has been the contention of the commission over the years, but both houses of the National Assembly believe that setting up Electoral Offences Commission would amount to avoidable addition to the bureaucracy.

    If the country could vote billions of Naira for elections frequently, why should establishing a specialised agency to track and prosecute offenders be regarded as too heavy a burden on the treasury? Unless offenders are prosecuted irrespective of their standing in the society, there would be no deterrence and impunity would continue.

    South Africa, Ghana, Sierra-Leone, Senegal, Cote d’Ivoire and Benin Republic have perfected the act of conducting internationally certified elections. Nigeria took a step forward in 2015 when the incumbent President was defeated and he peacefully handed over to the winner. We will do well to build on this so as to be listed among countries with the best electoral systems.

    It is time to draw the curtains on that dark episode by proving that the law is indeed blind. It is not enough to introduce biometric registration, the permanent voter card and the card reader, saboteurs of the system should have their day in court, and, if found guilty, serve jail terms.

  • The umpire who failed us

    Long before his appointment as Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) chairman in 2005, Prof Maurice Madukolam Iwu had served as national commissioner representing Imo State. In that capacity Iwu was in the centre of the commission’s power matrix. The national commissioners and the chairman determine what happens in INEC. The chairman as it were is the first among equals. So Iwu already knew how the commission works before he mounted the saddle. With his experience of the inner workings of INEC much was expected of Iwu.

    The professor of pharmacognosy also promised to do his best to redeem INEC’s image. But, he ended up shattering what remained of that image. When it comes to elections, Nigerians hardly trust their electoral commissions. The people do not have faith in the electoral umpire because it panders to those in power. An electoral agency is supposed to be above board. It is expected to be impartial in the discharge of its duties for democracy to thrive. And democracy thrives where elections are free and fair  But our elections have always been marred by irregularities because of the inadequacies of our electoral commissions.

    No matter how principled and honourable many of the chairmen were before assuming office once they get the job they throw these attributes away for filthy lucre. They believe that their appointment is an opportunity to make money and without any qualms they throw themselves into the political arena and become more partisan than the politicians themselves. The politicians too who are ever ready to get someone to do their dirty job quickly read the situation and put the electoral umpire on their payroll. With free money pouring in from right, left and centre, the umpire loses his sense of judgment.

    He no longer sees himself as serving his country; he feels beholden to the politician who picks his bills. Although the commission takes care of all his needs, the chairman is never satisfied until he gets that extra change from his new master, the politician. The job is full of temptation and it takes only a chairman with the fear of God to survive in our highly corrupt political process. In the Second Republic, former Federal Electoral Commission (FEDECO) chairman the late Justice Victor Ovie-Whiskey caused a stir when he told reporters on being asked ‘’whether water passed under the bridge’’ during the much-criticised 1983 election that he would faint if he saw N1million. Then N1million was a lot of money. Today that amount could be the equivalent of N10billion or more.

    What I am trying to say going by the eminent jurist’s remark is even where the umpire does not go out of his way to look for free money such money will come looking for him through unscrupulous politicians and their ilk. Only an umpire, who is not on the take like the late Ovie-Whiskey, can emphatically say that he will faint on seeing a million naira. Many such honest men still abound in the country, but unfortunately they will not touch the electoral umpire’s job even with a 10-foot pole for reasons best known to them. Iwu should have learnt one or two things from the late Dr Abel Guobadia who he succeeded. The late Guobadia would have conducted the 2007 election if he had not died two months to the poll. But fate decided otherwise.

    Instead of using the opportunity to write his name in gold Iwu chose infamy. The 2007 election conducted under his watch remains till date the worst poll ever in the history of our country. It was a charade of an election. Both foreign and domestic observers condemned the election, which was marred by barefaced rigging and other malpractices. The victory of many of those elected during the exercise was voided by the courts. The late President Umaru Yar’Adua also condemned the poll, promising electoral reforms before the 2011 election. If a winner, and the president for that matter,  could condemn his own election shouldn’t the umpire just keep quiet and watch? No, not Iwu as he went about defending the indefensible. He even had the temerity to describe the election as one of the best ever in the country.

    He was only deluding himself. He did not stop there. Under him, INEC joined issues with petitioners at the election tribunals rather than just stay out of the way. Some of the judges were baffled by the commission’s stand that they wondered what it was up to. They could not believe that a supposed impartial umpire could come to court to take side with a party. An electoral commission does not work like that, they held. Iwu still did not take the hint. A wise man would have pulled the brakes there and then. But, as they say, he carried his sacrifice beyond the mosque, huffing and puffing about how he would conduct the 2011 election. He was daydreaming. Acting President Goodluck Jonathan, as he then was, removed him in April 2010.

    Now, Iwu’s name has been written in the hall of infamy for his poor conduct of the 2007 election. Based on the judgements of some tribunals, he along with scores of others has been tagged as ‘’electoral offenders’’ by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC). The commission has recommended that they be prosecuted by the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice. According to NHRC Executive Secretary Prof Bem Angwe, “unless steps are strengthened to deal with electoral impunity, the right to vote and be voted for and related rights will continually be infringed upon with adverse consequences on democratic governance’’.

    I agree with Angwe. If we do not do anything to stop electoral impunity our democracy will be in danger. What is democracy without free, fair and credible elections? Nothing, absolutely nothing. This is why the “electoral offenders”, particularly those involved in the conduct of the elections, should be tried and severely punished if found guilty to deter others.

  • Jega : An electoral umpire’s burden

    When five years ago, President Goodluck Jonathan was planning to appoint Prof Attahiru Jega as Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) chairman, he spoke glowingly about the activist academic. It was an appointment he kept close to his chest as the media kept speculating about who will get the job after the disastrous tenure of Prof Maurice Iwu. Having seen what happened under Iwu, who conducted the sham election which brought him and the late President Umaru Yar’Adua to office, the president knew that he had to pick a man of integrity for the job.

    So, as he kept the public guessing  on who his choice would be, Jonathan did not allow any opportunity go by without making it known that his man for the job is someone that cannot be pushed around. ”I have found the man for the job; we have contacted him and he is ready to take up the job. He is a man of integrity and Nigerians will be happy with our choice when we announce his name”. The president was virtually over the moon when he picked Jega for the INEC job. He knew very well that to continue to endear himself to Nigerians whoever he picked as electoral umpire must be above board.

    Jonathan made a statement with his choice of Jega, who he knew as an uncompromising figure, yet chose him for the highly sensitive INEC job.  Jega is not just an academic, he is a unionist to boot, having been president of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) in the late 80s. He led ASUU during the military regime and he gave a good account of himself.

    A man like him is no doubt needed to head INEC, which under Iwu had become an appendage of government. Since his coming, Jega has tried his utmost to maintain the independence of INEC, despite coming under blistering  attacks from the parties sometimes for being impartial. This is expected. There is no way Jega could have satisfied all the parties, especially when it comes to elections. There is no party that wishes to lose an election; every party wants to win and where it does not, the next thing is to cry foul.

    It is understandable when a party challenges the competence of the electoral umpire after an election. If that happens, it is likely the party is crying because it lost. But when before an election everything is being done to rubbish the electoral umpire, then something must be amiss. It becomes more worrisome when those badmouthing the electoral umpire are members of the ruling party. In the past few months, Jega has been the butt of destructive criticisms by the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its chieftains and the problem they have with him is because he never agreed with them  that the February 14 and 28 elections as initially scheduled should be postponed.

    Although the party gave the impression that it was not bothered one way or the other with  what INEC decides to do about the elections,  latter events showed that the party, its national leader, that is the president, and its leading lights were all for the postponement of the elections, but getting Jega to do their bidding without being seen as the ones pulling the string was their problem. They eventually got the security chiefs to force Jega’s hands to shift the polls to March 28 and April 11. Despite having their way, they are still after Jega. They are not ready to let him be until they push him out of office.

    Why does PDP want Jega out of office? It is to ensure that it has its way at the polls.  His  integrity that counted in his favour when he was appointed in 2010 is now hanging around his neck as an albatross. The PDP can no longer stand the integrity of the man whose praise the president sang to high heavens when he was appointing him five years ago as INEC chairman. So, instead of getting set for the rescheduled elections, the party is busy fishing for reasons to get Jega out of the way to enable it rig its way back into power. So far, they have  not given any tangible reason why Jega should not conduct the forthcoming elections.

    Having succeeded in getting the elections postponed, one would have expected PDP to go back to the drawing board to plan and map out plans for the forthcoming elections. But no, it is not doing that; all it is after is to get Jega replaced by another professor, who it can manipulate to get its way at the polls. But removing Jega legally will not be easy. So, they will not take the legal route; they may give him the Lamido Sanusi treatment. Remember, the president went outside the enabling Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Act to get Sanusi out of the way because he was too vocal for his liking. With Jega too independent-minded for his liking, Jonathan may devise a way of removing him without following the Constitution.

    According to Section 157 (1) of the 1999 Constitution as amended, subject to the provisions of subsection (3) of this section, a person holding any of the offices to which this section applies may only be removed from that office by the president acting on an address supported by two-thirds majority of the Senate praying that he be so removed for inability to discharge the functions of the office (whether arising from infirmity of mind or body or any cause) or for misconduct. By virtue of this provision, the president cannot on his own remove Jega nor can he send him on terminal leave whimsically. But then, this is Nigeria where anything goes.

    The cards are stacked against those who want Jega out of INEC.  They do not have a case against him; they are just afraid that with him at the helm, they cannot get INEC to rig the elections for PDP. They said the elections should be postponed because millions of eligible voters had not collected their Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs).

    Now that a substantial number has collected PVCs, their song is that the Temporary Voter Cards (TVCs), which have been exchanged for PVCs, should be used for the elections. Does this make sense? Does it not show that some people somewhere are afraid of contesting the elections? Jega conducted one of the best elections ever held in this country in 2011 and since then, INEC under his watch, has been improving with the series of staggered elections held in some states.

    Like every human being, Jega is not a saint. But, what sin has he committed to warrant the call for his removal by PDP chieftains and their cohorts. What do they know that we do not know that informed their call? Is it at this 11th hour that we should be talking of removing Jega or sending him on terminal leave when he is not sick nor involved in any misdemeanour? All these PDP chieftains are doing is to give a dog a bad name in order to hang it. The president should not fall for their trick. It is heartening that the president has reassured the world that he won’t remove Jega.  But we hope that when push becomes shove, the president will not sing a different tune.

  • An umpire’s role

    An umpire’s role

    Here is the period of life against which we had been warned through the wisdom of Ubayyi Bn Ka‘b and that of Abdullah Bn Mas‘ud. Here is the time in life when truth becomes totally abhorrent while falsehood and mischief are loftily upheld. Should this period linger and nothing changes in it, the world may (soon) reach a stage where the bereaved will rather rejoice than grieve over the demise of a close relation and parents will rather grieve than rejoice over the birth of a new baby”.

    By an Arab poet

     

    Preamble

    Read the above quotation once again and compare it with the current social, political and economic trends in Nigeria. In a situation like this where suicide through insurgency is in vogue for teenagers; where throwing away of newly born babies by young, unmarried women is taken for civilisation; where kidnapping has become a lucrative business and oil theft is now a unique profession; where rebellion and terrorism are the order of the day, one can hardly see anything other than the signals of the end of time.

    For majority of Nigerians today, life is so much upside down that the children of textile magnates now walk the streets in rags even as the children of meat sellers of yore now eat bones. The highly valued norms of our society that once constituted the pinnacle of glory in the life of Nigerians have sadly become objects of ridicule while vagabondism and unbridled brigandage have replaced those norms. Like prodigal children of history, Nigerians now live in a land of unrealisable dream and peregrinate aimlessly in the desert of pauperism. And the compass with which to find the way to the Cape of Good Hope has been lost by those who are claiming to be the crew on our nation’s boat. Where are we going from here?

     

    Memorial Inscription

    Whenever I remember an inscription once placed, conspicuously, at the entrance of the University of Cordoba, in Spain, my heart bleeds. In the antiquity of that inscription is the summary of what the world should be as against what it is today. I first saw the inscription in 1985 when I accompanied the late Bashorun MKO Abiola to Spain where he delivered a lecture on ‘Islamic Economic System’. It read thus: “The world is held together by four formidable pillars: the wisdom of the learned, the justice of the great, the prayer of the righteous and the valour of the brave”. (University of Cordoba is the very first University ever established in the world. It was established by the Muslim Arabs in Spain in the seventh century CE).

    At the foundation of the four pillars mentioned above are two key words that link man directly to God. The two words are: TRUTH AND JUSTICE. Without those two abstract but ruling words, it would have been impossible for humanity to remain in peace and harmony.

    Perhaps no scholar in the contemporary world has given a more connotative definition to TRUTH than Sheikh Uthman Dan Fodio did. In that axiomatic definition which The Guardian  of Nigeria has adopted for its official insignia, the great scholar described Truth as “an open wound which only the conscience can heal”. And, in Islam, JUSTICE is a corollary of TRUTH. Both are the armour with which two unique persons are fortified in the course of their responsibilities.

    The two persons are the umpire and the witness.

     

    Truth and Justice

    Uthman Dan Fodio’s definition of TRUTH was based on his understanding of Allah’s counsel for mankind thus: “Do not encapsulate truth in falsehood, nor hide the truth deliberately….” Q. 2: 42. And Prophet Muhammad (SAW) also admonished the Muslims thus: “Speak the truth even if it be against you”.

    Truth and Justice are like a pair of scissors. They work together inseparably. And, just as no scissors can function effectively with just one blade so can no building stand without a foundation. Truth is the foundation of Justice. Wherever the two are constantly found, all vices disappear into permanent oblivion.

    In Islam, nothing is more important than Truth and Justice. In 245 places in the Qur’an, Allah talks of the essence of Truth in the life of man with emphasis. Also, in 28 places, in the same Glorious Book, He guides mankind on Justice and frowns emphatically at injustice.

    That is why, (in a genuine Islamic society), no man can become an Imam, a Judge, an umpire or even be accepted as a witness unless there is evidence that he is truthful and just.

     

    Breach of Trust

    The first step towards the breach of trust can be found in a situation where a person who is involved in a case is the one to appoint the judge. This happens in various forms. For instance, injustice is expected to occur where the coach of a football team is responsible for assigning a referee to a match involving his team. A better example is a situation where a ruling party or a contestant in an election is the one to appoint the umpire in such election as it happens in Nigeria. With that alone, the basis of trust has been destroyed, especially if that umpire reports to the same person who appoints him. In such a situation, no amount of verbal assurances or persuasion can convince anybody. And any contest based on that situation is based on injustice.

     

    Down the memory lane

    Students of Arabic grammar should be able recall an episode during the golden era of Abbasid dynasty in Iraq. That was the time when Islamic knowledge flourished almost to its peak and Arabic grammar was taking its final formation. Two famous schools of Arabic language coexisted in Iraq at that time. One was in Basrah. The other was in Kuffah. They were headed by Sibawayh (a Persian) and Kisai (an Arab), respectively.

    The Basrah School specialised in syntax. The Kuffah School specialised in morphology. But both schools were in a fierce competition and none could be said to be superior to the other.

    However, some concerned scholars who wanted to establish the base of superiority between the two schools decided to put both to test. A grammatical question was raised. And the two leaders were invited to answer it analytically. Here is the question: “I have always thought that the hornet was more poisonous than the scorpion”. Two answers were provided for that question. One was “and it happens to be so”. The other was “and it is exactly so”. The examinees were expected to pick only one answer.

    What Sibawayh and Kisai were requested to do in answering the question was to analyse the full complement of any question they picked grammatically. Kisai chose the first answer while Sibawayh chose the second. The panel of judges was divided on the matter but the opinion of the leader of the panel prevailed. Kisai was thus declared the winner and Kuffah School was proclaimed superior.

    Disappointed that the judgment was partial in favour of his rival Sibawayh who was impeccably renowned, intellectually, did not return to his home base in Basrah. Rather, he migrated to a remote village where he spent the rest of his life in frustration and died miserably.

    It was many years after his death that the incident was revisited and Sibawayh was found to be correct while Kisai was wrong. But then, the die had been cast as the demised victor could not rejoice over his victory.

     

    Nepotism

    Going into why the first judgment was faulty, researchers discovered that the head of the first panel was Kisai’s cousin. And so, the judgment was deliberately given to reflect nepotism. Over 1,000 years after that episode, Nigeria staged a similar show in 1993 at a macro level. And it ended in a fiasco called the June 12 debacle. In the show, an MKO Abiola won the freest and fairest election ever held in this country but was denied victory and made to die miserably in prison.

    The result is the ongoing spectre casting a political spell on Nigeria and constituting a pendulum of uncertainty on the citizenry.

     

    Neutrality of an umpire

    Whoever is appointed an umpire or finds himself in such a position must bring his conscience to bear. He must not only be truthful, just, upright and conscientious, he must also see himself as being in the presence of the Almighty God in his open conduct and secret deeds. An umpire can be a judge in a court of law, an arbiter in a dispute, a referee in a boxing ring, a moderator in an election or a ruler of a nation. Each of these is expected by God and by man to be just in his arbitration, rule or dealings. As such, he must not just wear the garb of neutrality; he must also be vividly seen in that garb. It hoped that the INEC boss, Professor Attahiru Jega would read this article.

    As an umpire, pitching tent with an individual or a group against another in a contest can only amount to a breach of natural law, a betrayal of trust and a violation of justice all of which can incur the wrath of God. No man in the position of an umpire has ever betrayed the course of justice without paying dearly for it in the end.

    Where the chief executive officer of a country becomes the chief law breaker through deliberate falsehood, vicious treachery, audacious injustice, treasury looting, and playing of god-fatherism to illegality and gangsterism, it is only natural to expect repercussion in whatever form. A former one time Governor of Kaduna State, Group Captain Usman Jibrin (now of blessed memory) warned Nigerian Muslim leadership against injustice in 1994, at a meeting of the Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs held in Arewa House, Kaduna, and headed by the former Sultan, Alhaji Ibrahim Dasuki.

    When some Muslim elders present at that meeting, who were expected to uphold the truth, started to speak from both sides of their mouths on the June 12, 1993 election annulment, Group Captain Jibrin rose courageously to call a spade its name quoting the following verses of the Qur’an: “And guard against a calamity that may descend not only on evil perpetrators but also on their aides as well. And know that Allah’s punishment can be very severe.”

     

    Truth like gold

    Truth is like gold. It can be smelted and panel-beaten after taken through the furnace. But when it becomes an adorned ornament its beauty remains forever. The misfortune of history as a teacher is that people refuse to learn from its lessons. In Nigeria, like in most other African countries, greed is the very basis of injustice. Every action by the so called leaders is measured in terms of dollars and Euros accruing to their pockets from the national treasury. But Allah is patient. He allows unjust rulers and political demagogues to pull a long rope before they end up hanging themselves with the same rope.

    Who can be a better judge of actions and intentions than Allah?

    Democracy is stable in the Western world because greed is not vivid in the culture of that world. The former American President, Bill Clinton, was living in a four bedroom bungalow before he assumed office in 1992. It was to that same bungalow that he returned in year 2000 after serving two terms of eight years as President of the world’s most powerful country. Can the same be said of Nigerian leaders after Ahmadu Bello, Abubakar Tafawa Balewa and Murtala Muhammed? And, given this situation, in which Nigeria finds herself today, does one need to gaze through the crystal ball to know why the life span in Nigeria came down to 43 years in 2006 from 52 years that it was in 1999 even as winning the coming elections has been declared ‘a do or die affair’?

     

    INEC under watch

    Now, we are going through another acid test in the hands of justice.

    All eyes are on the umpire called Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) even as the world waits to see the direction to which Nigeria will head through the general elections that start in a week’s time. Confidence has been eroded. Fears have been expressed in various quarters. Prayers have been offered by millions of Muslims and Christians in the country. It is our hope that INEC will live by the name of an umpire if for posterity sake. It is also our fervent prayer that the Almighty Allah will allay all fears in the land and rescue Nigerians from the crushing manacle with which Satan has fettered this country to its own stake. Amen.