Only credible nominees will be confirmed as RECs — Nazif

The Chairman of the Senate Committee on INEC, Senator Suleiman Nazif (APC, Bauchi North) said yesterday that the report on the screening of Resident Electoral Commissioners (RECs) will be ready next week.

President Muhammadu Buhari had in March submitted names of 27 persons for confirmation as RECs to the Senate. The screening of the nominees had been concluded.

Speaking in an interview, Senator Nazif said they were working towards presenting the report to the plenary next week for further legislative actions.

“We have completed the screening; the stage we are now is the assessment of the performance of the nominees; after that, we would write our report and hopefully, it would be laid next week,” he said.

He assured Nigerians that only credible nominees would be confirmed by the Senate as part of efforts to strengthen Nigeria’s democracy.

“I want to assure you that only credible people with integrity and that can be trusted would be confirmed as RECs. If we get it right, the country’s democracy would be better for it. If we get the right persons, the 2019 elections would be the best,” he said.

On petitions against some of the nominees, Senator Nazif said they would look them. “We would thoroughly look at the petitions with all seriousness,” he said.