The leaders of the Nigerians in Diaspora Organisation (NIDO) are in the country to ensure that about 17 million of their members spread across the world participate in elections to choose those to be at the helm of the country.

At a joint press conference ahead of the July 25th Diaspora Day celebration, NIDO's Chairman, Mr. Kenneth Gbandi, disclosed that the organisation was sending a delegation to meet with the leadership of the National Assembly to achieve the goal.

He expressed optimism that the quest for voting rights for Nigerians in diaspora would be actualised since there is a budgetary provision for the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) to capture the data and issue identity cards to them abroad.

The Chairman of NIDO's Board of Trustees, Mr. Samuel Adewusi, who spoke in the same vein, stressed the need to pass the Electoral Act and the 1999 Constitution as amended to pave the way for diaspora voting.

He wondered why Nigeria is yet to take a cue from less endowed countries like South Africa and Niger on the issue of diaspora voting and representation in the National Assembly.

Reiterating NIDO's commitment to providing brain power and technology transfer to the country, he said the fact that Nigerians in the diaspora remitted $24 billion to the Nigeria economy in 2015 spoke volume of the organisation's contribution to the development of the country.

"We are not boasting here. If you look at the $24 billion, it is more than what Nigeria gets in foreign direct investment within five years from the West, our so-called friends. But for those remittances, I don't think Nigeria would be in this position now to talk.

"Those remittances alone are enough to show what Nigerians abroad are doing for this country, not to talk of what we have to give in areas of technology transfer, knowledge transfer like the ICT, and the trauma centre being built by one of us," he said.
http://allafrica.com/stories/201707240041.html

Booked

Interesting let's see how NASS respond to this.

I support diaspora voting only for presidential elections.