Twenty one Resident
Electoral
Commissioners, RECs,
of the Independent
National Electoral
Commission, INEC, have
rejected a proposal to
postpone Nigeria’s
general elections billed
for February 14 and 28.
In a vote conducted
Saturday by the INEC
chairman, Attahiru Jega,
after he met with
political parties and the
civil society, 21 RECs
said the elections
should continue as
planned while 16 others
voted in support of a
reschedule. Nigeria has
37 RECs, each for a
state and the Federal
Capital, Abuja.
The outcome of the
vote came as Nigerians
await INEC’s decision on
whether the elections
are moved or not.
After 17 political parties
voted for a
postponement as
against 11 that argued
for INEC to remain
faithful to its time
table, the mood across
the land suggested that
INEC will capitulate to a
demand by military and
security chiefs asking
for a six weeks
postponement on the
presumed grounds that
they have a special
operations to we
against the six year
insurgency which
appears to be spreading
on a daily basis.
Civil society leaders,
organized in support of
credible and transparent
elections in Nigeria,
otherwise called the
Nigeria Civil Society
Situation Room, reacted
sharply blasting the
security chiefs accusing
them of fomenting a
surreptitious coup
against democracy.
In their own
consultative meeting
with the INEC top
brass, the Situation
Room called for the
resignation of military
chiefs and security
heads including the
Police “on account of
their inability to exercise
their constitutional
responsibility to secure
lives and property at all
times including during
the elections.”
Speaking for the group
in its statement,
Agianpe Ashang, a
senior programme
officer at the Policy and
Legal Advocacy Centre,
PLAC, said the action of
the security chiefs
“amounted to blackmail
[to] arm-twist the
Election Management
Body away from its
constitutional
guaranteed function of
conducting elections.”
The group them asked
Nigerians to defend
their hard won struggle
to entrench democracy
in the country.
Jibrin Ibrahim, a senior
fellow at the Centre for
Democracy and
Development, CDD, in
Abuja, who was at the
meeting, said Mr. Jega
told the meeting that
security operatives
informed INEC that they
were commencing a six
weeks special
operations against Boko
Haram insurgents in the
north eastern corridors
of the country and
would rather not be
distracted by the
elections.
The opposition All
Progressives Congress,
APC, has rejected any
plan to postpone the
election saying such
calls are sponsored by
President Goodluck
Jonathan and the ruling
party to stave their
imminent defeat at the
polls.
The reasoning among
civil society members
align with popular
enthusiasm for the
election even in the
north eastern regions
where the insurgency is
active.
According to a political
survey recently
conducted by the NOI
polls, analysis by geo-
political zones revealed
that the North-West
(89%) and South-East
(87%) regions
accounted for the
largest proportions of
Nigerians who
expressed optimism for
voting in the 2015
general elections when
compared to other
regions, although a
majority of residents in
all the geo-political
zones expressed
optimism in voting in
the 2015 general
elections, with a
minimum 76% (North
Central). Also,
respondents aged 46-60
and 18-21 years
showed more optimism
for voting in the 2015
elections than other
age-groups.
It is not clear what the
commission’s eventual
decision would be with
the latest voting
pattern by the RECs.
Mr. Jega is expected to
brief the media any
moment from now.