N/Assembly reorders sequence of election
election which usually comes first will now hold last.
The Senate passed the amendment following the adoption of the report of the conference committee chaired by Senator Suleiman Nazif (APC, Bauchi).
Immediately after the vote on the amendment, senators including Abdullahi Adamu, Kabiru Gaya and Ovie Omo-Agege raised a point of order, faulting the procedures adopted for the passage.
However, the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, ruled them out of order.
“No matter what the subject matter is, for conference report it has been the procedure and as such with all due respect I have to rule out of order,” he said.
Angered by the development, Senator Abdullahi Adamu led nine of his colleagues to address newsmen on the passage of the amendment. Present at the briefing were Senator Omo-Agege, Malam Ali Wakili, Abu Ibrahim, Abdullahi Gumel, Binta Masi, Yahaya Abdullahi, Andrew Uchendu and Benjamin Uwajumogu.
The protesting senators said 59 of them are against the passage of the amendment. Our correspondent reports that at the moment, the APC has 60 senators, PDP 48 and APGA one. All those who were against the passage are APC members.
Abdullahi Adamu queries the rush
At the briefing, Senator Abdullahi Adamu said they were totally against the change of election sequence, describing the passage as rushed.
“We are part of the whole of the senators who oppose the process by which the socalled conference report was laid and considered. I had the opportunity, I was heard but the Senate president said my observation was being noted.
“The reliance upon the relevant statutes, some of which have actually not been signed to the best of our knowledge, and we did challenge that, anybody who had the signed copy should have produced it there so as to check doubting Thomases.
“We believe the process was rushed. There is no need for the rush. Give everybody the opportunity. There is no reason for just two people to speak on the issue. It’s not the tradition of the Senate. And then the question is put and that’s it, just because it’s a conference report.
“We are against what has happened. We are not the only ones. If you take note of the report that was circulated, the chairman and co-chair did not sign it. We don’t know why they didn’t sign.
“Why do we want to make a law that addresses one particular issue targeted at a person. This is very partisan. You could see from the body language, from the utterances that it is a predetermined thing by a political party that is threatened by the APC government. Whatever incumbency gives to anyone we are denying that one. We are not part of this endorsement,” he said.
59 of us are against it - Omo-Agege
Also speaking, Omo-Agege said 59 of them are against the passage of the amendment.
“For some of you who are familiar with what transpired in the House of Reps, only 36 members were on the floor when this so-called amendment to Section 25 of the Electoral Act was introduced. The position we took is that 36 people cannot determine the destiny of 360 people in the house which is now being carried over to 109 in the Senate.
“The least we are owed is for this socalled amendment to be deliberated upon and our rule is clear. We have 59 senators who are opposed to the inclusion of Section 25 of the Electoral Act. If that division was allowed today, 59 senators would have voted to delete that purported amendment to Section 25.
“You don’t make a law to target one person. The perception is that the law is targeted at the president. I will continue to protest it. I can tell you it will not become a law,” he said.
Amendment not economical - Binta Masi
On her part, Senator Binta Garba Masi (APC, Adamawa) said the reordering was not economical.
“Now we are having economic crisis in our hands and instead of us to look at the welfare and wellbeing of our people, we are looking at selfish interest in the longrun.
It’s self serving - Wakili
Also speaking, Senator Malam Ali Wakili (APC, Bauchi) said the amendment was self serving. “Why did they wait until after the INEC has come out with the timetable? If we look at the cost-benefit to the economy, four elections in one month! It is not well for the economy, politics and security.
“We had, inside this chamber, considered conference reports and we dissolved into house, looked at them clause by clause, raised observations and returned them back to the House of Reps. Why must it be different in this case?” he said.
It’s illegal -Uchendu
Senator Andrew Uchendu (APC, Rivers ) said the amendment was illegal.
Citing Section 132(1), he said the change of the sequence was in conflict with the law, saying the constitution overrides any other law.
Section 132(1) reads: “An election to the office of President shall be held on a date to be appointed by the Independent National Electoral Commission.
We’ve no business sequence -Kurfi on Due process followed -Sabi election
Senator Umaru Kurfi (APC, Katsina) also described the amendment as illegal.
“This is absolutely wrong. We are lawmakers, elections are for INEC, so why should we worry ourselves with election? This thing they are doing is absolutely illegal. There is no way they can achieve it,” he said.
Spokesman of the Senate, Aliyu Sabi Abdullahi (APC, Niger) and Senator Suleiman Nazif (APC, Bauchi) addressed the press countering the claims of the Senator Abdullahi Adamu-led camp.
In a swift reaction, Sabi said due process was followed in the amendment of the Electoral Act. He said the amendment was done to deepen democracy.
“By our procedures, the Senate has passed its own version, the house has passed its own version, the next thing to do is to have a conference committee to harmonise.
“Our rule says whatever position we have taken, and there is a similar one in the house, we harmonise but where the house has taken a position that we have not taken, we are bound compulsorily to adopt that of the house.
“Where the Senate has taken a position and the house has not, that conference committee is bound to adopt the recommendation from the Senate. I think within the context of this particular assignment, that is what happened,” he said.
Odds against N/Assembly’s reordering election sequence
The National Assembly’s re-ordering of elections is not a fait accompli because there are other hurdles ahead, Daily Trust reports.
The new decisions taken by both the House of Representatives and Senate, which puts presidential election last in the sequence of 2019 elections, were at variance with what INEC said. Credible sources close to INEC and the presidency said the National Assembly’s decision might suffer a setback.
“President Muhammadu Buhari has enormous powers of disallowing the amendment to sail through,” a source close to the presidency, said. “He can withhold signing it into law if he pleases and time frame of election might not give the National Assembly the latitude to do something funny,” he said.
“But most importantly, INEC can go to court and have the National Assembly’s decision dismissed with dispatch,” the source added.
The general impression was that the idea was self-serving and might likely work against President Muhammadu Buhari in the event he decides to run for a second term next year.
When contacted on the matter, Spokesman of INEC chairman, Mr Rotimi Oyekanmi said he did not hear of any plan of going to court for now.
“Not to my knowledge,” he said in a text message last night. But a different source at INEC said in the event the electoral commission decides to go to court, it will out rightly win the case.
“There is nowhere in the world an act of parliament overrides the Constitution of the country. Section 132(1) of the 1999 Constitution is explicit, it says elections should be held on a date determined by INEC; so what happened in the National Assembly is a nullity of sort,” he said.
“This is besides other encumbrances on the number of legislators who participated in amending the Electoral Act…there was no quorum in any of the chambers,” he said.