The Independent National Electoral Commission has said it has identified ways political parties and their candidates buy votes during elections. The commission vowed to end the practice in the 2019 Gelections.

Chairman of INEC, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, said one of the tricks is that politicians insert currency notes into loaves of bread or sandwich they give voters at the polling units under the guise of feeding the party faithful.

Yabuku made this known in Abuja on Monday at a one-day public hearing organised by the Joint Committee on INEC of the National Assembly, themed, ‘Vote buying and improving electoral processes in Nigeria.’

Those at the event included the President of the Senate, Bukola Saraki; Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara; Chairman of INEC, Mahmood Yakubu; Senior Special Assistant to the President on National Assembly Matters (Senate), Senator Ita Enang; representatives of political parties and security agencies, as well as traditional and religious leaders.

Others were the Chairman, Senate Committee on INEC, Senator Suleiman Nazif; and Chairman, House Committee on INEC and Political Parties’ Affairs, Mrs Aishatu Dukku, and principal officers of the Senate and House of Representatives.

Yakubu said, “Since 1999, we have heard several confessional statements by willing partisan actors on how our electoral process is subverted and voters as well as election personnel are induced through the use of food items, kitchen utensils, automobiles, electrical appliances, clothing, toiletries, sandwich and so on, on an election day.

“Here, when I talk about sandwich, I am not talking about food. There is a way voters are induced using two slices of bread; sandwiched between the two slices is a currency note. So, the sandwich shared is not sandwich as in food, it is a sandwich for voter inducement. In turn, candidates induce the electorate in a general election.

“In order to address the menace of vote-buying, we need to break the chain of voter inducement. Otherwise, we cannot expect to eradicate the problem in the secondary election, where many of the players, perpetrators are beneficiaries of voter inducement at the primary elections.”

The INEC boss said the commission had witnessed “so many” instances of vote-buying, including aspirants who induce party delegates to get elected as candidate from the ward to local government and state levels. He said the candidate would in turn buy votes from the electorate to win election.

“It is a chain, it is a spiral that we need to break. It is not only when vote-buying takes place at the polling unit that it becomes a problem. It is systemic,” he stated.

According to him, there is a correlation between the resort to open vote-buying at polling units and the improvements made in the electoral processes.

He said while the days of ballot box and result sheet snatching were over, vote buyers had devised means of following the voters to the polling units to ensure that they actually vote for them.

“The commission has been playing a cat-and-mouse game with some political actors, and we will continue to play this game until we defeat political actors who have that kind of mindset in our electoral process.

“There are other ways by which voters are induced. Posting of party agents to polling units and getting the voters to show them who they voted as a precondition for payment. I am sure that this is well known. There is nothing new in what I am saying.

“Buying agents of other political parties, and getting them to compromise against their political parties on election day. Surrendering the permanent voter card to middlemen as a precondition for assessing government amenities and facilities, it is also a form of vote-buying,” he said.

The INEC boss commended the National Assembly for conducting the hearing and choosing to discuss vote-buying.

He said, “With just 67 days to the 2019 elections, the decision to focus on vote-buying is duly appropriate. The fact that it is organised by the National Assembly by way of public hearing is a demonstration of the concern that we all have, that vote-buying must be tackled and must not be allowed to define our elections and democratic process.

“For us in INEC, the practice of vote-buying is unacceptable and it must not define our democracy. The truth is that we must all condemn the process and find a lasting solution to the problem. It is illegal, undemocratic and morally poignant and a threat to the sanctity of the ballot. It debases our electoral democracy, enthrones unaccountable leadership, denies citizens quality representation, deprives the nation of the opportunity to address the challenges of development and harms the nation with a bad name internationally.”

“However, for this public hearing to be meaningful and for there to be solution to the menace of vote buying, we must be frank in our discussion, practical in our suggestions and committed to the implementation of actionable recommendations.”

https://all-gists..com/2018/12/senate-public-hearing-inec-pdp-trade-blame-over-rigging.html

Good Morning [Nairalander]

.