Barely four months to next year’s general election, opposition is mounting against the chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Professor Mahmood Yakubu, with a plot to instigate the National Assembly to pass a vote of no confidence which could lead to his suspension or removal.
Saturday Sun gathered that some politicians, who are not at ease with the INEC chairman’s insistence on wholly deploying technology in the conduct of the elections are trying to infiltrate the Senate, knowing that only the legislative arm of government can cause the suspension or removal of the head of the electoral Commission.
According to the 1999 Constitution, as amended, the President can only remove the INEC Chairman on the strength of a recommendation by the Senate. The President will have to rely on the nod of two-thirds of members of the Senate, the nation’s highest law-making body to discipline INEC chairman.
Section 157 (1) of the Constitution states that “Subject to the provision of subsection (3) of this Removal 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 other cause) or for misconduct.”
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Subsection 2 states: “This section applies to the office of the chairman and member of the Code of Conduct Bureau, the Federal Civil Service Commission, the Independent National Electoral Commission, the National Judicial Council, the Federal Judicial Service Commission, the Federal Character Commission, the Nigeria Police Force, the National Population Commission, the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission and the Police Service Commission.”
Saturday Sun gathered that politicians, who are predominantly members of a major political party, wants to get the Senate to shake Yakubu so that he could jettison the use of Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) in next year’s general elections.
BVAS and the INEC Election Result Viewing Portal are believed to be the two technological innovations celebrated for enhancing the transparency of election results and boosting public trust in electoral outcomes in recent elections.
According to INEC, the technologies will address ten key weaknesses in election result management process.
It said they include falsification of votes at polling units, falsification of number of accredited voters, collation of false results, mutilation of results and computational errors, swapping of results sheets, forging of results sheets, snatching and destruction of results sheets, obtaining declaration and return involuntarily, making declaration and return while result collation is still in progress and poor record-keeping.
A source said those opposed to Yakubu’s use of technology in the conduct of next year’s election want the Senate to initiate an inquiry on INEC preparation for the elections, with the view to finding fault in the whole process.
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It was learnt that such conclusion would then give impetus to the recommendation for a change of the leadership of INEC, which could truncate the plan for use of BVAS and other technological devises that would forestall election rigging.
Sources said that the nomination and confirmation of suspected members of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) as Resident Electoral Commissioners (RECs) was part of the programme to infiltrate the electorate body and reduce Yakubu’s strength to insist on certain things.
It was gathered that the intention is to undermine INEC chairman and foist party members on the nation’s electoral umpire to checkmate him ahead of next year’s general elections.
Already, it was gathered that some strong figures in the Senate, who are threatened by the strength of their opponents, are being mobilised to support the move against Yakubu.
Meanwhile, the Arewa Consultative Youth Movement has warned that any plan to remove Yakubu would be resisted.
According to the group’s President, Kabiru Abdullahi, “after extensive deliberations on the issues, we have formally passed a unanimous vote of confidence in the INEC Chairman and his team and encourage them to hold the forte and keep the flag flying.”
Professor Yakubu, who was first appointed INEC Chairman in 2015 by President Muhammadu Buhari, was re-appointed in 2020 for a second term in office.
Sun