bdul-Rahman Abubakar & Turaki Hassan
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[President Goodluck Jonathan]

President Goodluck Jonathan
Members of the National Assembly have come under intense pressure from the Presidency to ensure that President Goodluck Jonathan’s proposed amendment to the Electoral Act 2010 that will enable his ministers and aides to vote as delegates during party primary elections is passed, Daily Trust gathered from senior politicians in Abuja at the weekend.


Sources at the National Assembly said some of the lawmakers close to the President have been lobbying their colleagues to ensure that Section 87 ( of the Electoral Act is deleted as proposed by President Jonathan to allow political appointees to vote as delegates during congresses and conventions for selection of candidates.



Ministers and aides to chief executives at all levels were allowed to vote as delegates in past congresses and conventions but the National Assembly recently introduced a section in the Electoral Act 2010 barring appointed officials at all levels from voting as delegates. Section 87 ( of the Electoral Act states that “A political appointee at any level shall not be a voting delegate at the convention or congress of any political party for the purpose of nomination of candidates for any election.” Although the new provision was initially meant to loosen the grip of state governors on their state congresses, it boomeranged against President Jonathan when he began to face an unexpectedly strong challenge within the PDP for the presidential ticket.

A senator who spoke to Daily Trust off the record confirmed that pressure is being mounted to support the proposal but said many lawmakers have expressed opposition to the amendment as it will not only give President Jonathan undue advantage but will increase governors’ influence during the state congresses.

The senator said, “Several people have lobbied for the amendment to pass but we are not going to support it because it will amount to giving undue advantage to elected persons that are seeking for second term. If that section is deleted, the President can even go ahead to appoint more ministers and aides to give him an edge over other aspirants during primary election.

“Amending that section will also give additional powers to governors to decide who gets elected as candidates of parties. Take Governor Murtala Nyako for instance who recently appointed 15,000 special advisers. If they are all allowed to be delegates, nobody can stop him from clinching the party ticket.”

Another senator said the lawmakers are not happy with the Presidency, having been dumped after endorsing President Jonathan as Acting President at the height of the political intrigues brought about by the illness of then President Umaru Yar’adua.

The senator said, “Many of us are not happy with the way things are going. The President has forgotten about the lawmakers. Some of us are saying that they are not ready to pass the amendment unless they are guaranteed their return tickets the National Assembly by 2011.”

On his part, Rep Mohammed Ali Ndume (ANPP, Borno) said the lawmakers will not consider any issue other than the extension of time for INEC. He said, “The issue in consideration is the time frame that was inserted in the constitution and that has to be tempered with to provide room for INEC to do what it can do, that is credible elections within the time frame.

“So the issue of tampering with section 87 of the Electoral Act does not even arise. After all, we were conscious of the fact that should be part of the Electoral Act, that was why we put it there. Unfortunately for the President he is not constitutionally responsible for making laws; it is the National Assembly. And why we are insisting on internal democracy is that is the foundation for credible election. If you don’t have internal democracy within the political parties then whatever you build on it will not stand and in the end it will not make sense.

“That is what we will do. We will not allow that. I will raise my voice against that and I am sure that is the opinion of my colleagues because that is not what Nigerians are asking. In fact they are very happy with the Electoral Act; they have given us credit for producing a very credible Electoral Act. The only problem we had was that of time constraint and that is what we are going to look at. Anything outside that is not in the agenda of the National Assembly.”

Rep Bala Ibn Na’Allah (PDP, Kebbi), chairman of the House committee on Judiciary said, “We will not descend so low to do that because we want to give equal opportunity to all aspirants. It is aimed at giving room for everybody to participate without necessarily giving undue advantage to the incumbent. It will affect the credibility of the process when we are trying to have internal democracy in our political parties. We should not let the process be subject to manipulation especially at this moment of our existence as a nation. Everybody who loves Nigeria, with the situation we found ourselves in, we will do everything humanly possible to promote peace, stability and democracy.”

Also opposing the proposed amendment, Rep Samaila Mohammed (ANPP, Plateau) said, “We will resist any attempt to alter that section of the Electoral Act because we worked tirelessly to ensure internal democracy in all our political parties because the incumbents always have undue advantage over other aspirants. And we say we want to have free, fair and credible elections. To create a level playing ground, we must begin by dismantling those privileges the incumbents have.”

The National Assembly has commenced consideration of the amendments to the Electoral Act as proposed by President Jonathan and may take a debate on the general principles of the bill by this week.

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