Says officials connive with politicians to rig
elections
THOUGH the Independent National Electoral
Commission (INEC) is supposed to be an unbiased
umpire as regards electoral matters, the body is to
some extent bogged down by electoral malpractices.
According to the Chairman of the INEC, Prof.
Attahiru Jega, electoral fraud is perpetrated by
officials of his agency in connivance with politicians.
Jega, who noted that the actions of such members
and ad-hoc staff of the commission had continued to
rubbish the efforts of the commission in
transforming the process of electing public officers,
was reacting to various criticisms which the
commission received from some chairmen of
political parties and stakeholders who converged on
Abuja yesterday to witness the official unveiling and
public presentation of Strategic Programme of
Action of INEC from 2012 to 2016.
The INEC chairman noted, however, that many
officials of the commission who were identified to
have compromised standards had been either
prosecuted or dismissed from their duties in an
internal exercise without media hype.
Earlier in their reactions to the INEC strategic
programmes for credible elections, three different
chairmen of political parties , Chiefs Sam Nkire of
the Progressive Peoples Alliance (PPA), Chekwas
Okorie of the United Progressive Party (UPP) and
Victor Umeh of the All Progressive Grand Alliance
(APGA) had taken turns to urge INEC to improve on
its efforts to weed out the bad eggs in the
commission, stressing that their activities had
continued to inhibit the efforts of the commission as
well as cast doubts in the minds of Nigerians in
delivering a free and fair general elections in 2015
and beyond.
While Nkire stressed the need to checkmate some
corrupt INEC officials who he said had given INEC a
bad image by working in hand with security
operatives from the army and police to rewrite
election results, Okorie noted the need to expedite
action on the Electronic Voting System (EVS), saying
it would limit the mistakes of the commission.
On his part, Umeh urged INEC to review its position
on the recruitment of ad-hoc workers, saying that
given some of their actions, they posed great threats
to the success of INEC’s efforts in conducting credible
elections.
In his remarks, the United Nations Development
Programme (UNDP) representative, Prof. Sam Egwu
restated the organisation’s confidence in INEC and
its agencies, stressing that UNDP had continuously
voted its money for the Democratic Governance
Project (DGP) in the country that led to the
organization of a free and fair election in 2011. The
agency, however, urged the INEC chairman to use
the opportunity of the 2015 elections to improve on
its 2011 performance which was adjudged to be
credible by the UNDP
“For the avoidance of doubt, UNDP is actually
supporting the INEC with a number of partners that
we are familiar with. But more importantly, as we
commend the leadership of INEC for remaining
focused on the desire to improve on the credibility of
the 2015 elections beyond the remarkable
achievements of the 2011 elections, we also urge the
commission to improve. The strategic plan that is
being unveiled today we know has been a very long
and intensive consultative process which INEC
leadership has been engaged for the past one year.
The strategy we believe is not just to prepare for the
2015 elections, but to put in place a programme to all
relevant stakeholders that can lead to the ownership
of process as well as ensure that the electoral system
will become stable for the progress of the country. It
is our belief that we have produced a strategic plan,
INEC will follow through to… so that by 2015 and
beyond, we will look back and say that we have put
our money to support Nigeria in the areas that
matter most,” the UNDP representative stated.
Earlier, Chairman, Senate Committee on INEC, Andy
Uba who was represented by his deputy, Senator
Abdukadir Jagere, said that democracy could only be
said to have been sustained in Nigeria if INEC
improves on the gains of 2011 general elections.
The INEC Programme of Action Plan which spans
five years has the following as core objectives:
. To provide electoral operations, systems and
infrastructure to support delivery of free, fair and
credible elections;
. To improve voter education, training and research;
. To register political parties and monitor their
operations;
. To interact internationally and nationally with
relevant stakeholders; and
. To re-organise and re-position INEC for sustained
conduct of free, fair and credible elections.
According to the commission’s National
Commissioner and Chairman, Strategic Planning, Dr.
Nuru Yakubu, the action plan is action-oriented and
further seeks to achieve the overall mandate of INEC.

Source: www.theguardianmobile.com/readNewsItem1.php?nid=14861

I wonder how we will have a free and fair election in 2015 . At the moment INEC is not being sincere with the situation on ground . The so caller Junior staff will continue giving them bad names if the injustice presently been meted out to them is not looked into. Do Nigerians knw that some of this junior staff have over 6 yrs working experience with bsc and MSC qualifications and have been seeking for upgrade in the past 4yrs. But inec went ahead to recruit graduates early this to be their oga and u want them to feel hapi abi?
Let them continue to wait for a free and fair elections indeed.

Jonathan
Ebele
Goodluck
Azikiwe