Electoral Reform: Activist Tells President Buhari To Disband Nnamani Committee And Implement Uwais Report

A renowned human rights activist in Nigeria, Comrade Adeniyi, Alimi Sulaiman has called on the President Muhamamdu Buhari to disband the newly inaugurated Electoral Reform Committee headed by former Senate President, Senator Ken Nnamani, saying that the new Committee was another jamboree to give job to the political jobbers who were beneficiary of the manipulated electoral system in the land.

However, Comrade Sulaiman who is the Executive Chairman, Centre for Human Rights and Social Justice (CHRSJ) urged the President to implement the Justice Mohammed Uwais Electoral Reform Committee’s report and the report of the 2014 National Conference which dealth with the problems surrounding our electoral reforms as it affected our political space of the country.

It will be recalled that President Muhammadu Buhari, recently constituted a 24-man committee on Constitution and Electoral Reform headed by former Senate President Ken Nnamani and the Committee is expected to look into possible amendments to the Constitution and Electoral Act and come out with a more robust, endurable and generally acceptable electoral system.

This was contained in a statement issued and signed by Sulaiman on the development, which was made available to newsmen on Sunday, the rights activist,insisted that the Committee was a ploy to waste Nigeria precious time and meager resources at this period the country was facing the economy recession, advised the President to send the Uwais report to the National Assembly for implementation, instead of wasting huge resources on another Committee which the report would end up in archive.

Sulaiman who doubles as Chairman, Civil Societies Coalition for the Emancipation of Osun State (CSCEOS), also advised Buhari to purge the nation’s electoral body of bad eggs, particularly, those who were facing investigation on the mindboggling bribery scandal that rocked the Commission during the last general elections so as to serve as deterrent to others.

He then stated that all the electoral commission staff found guilty of corrupt charges over the last general elections, should be charged to court for proper prosecution and all their alleged owned property should be confiscated.

CHRSJ boss opined that the responsibility of conducting local government elections should be transferred to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) so as to deepen the democratic space in the local government of Nigeria, noting that the present state of the local governments in the hands of State Governors in Nigeria was nothing to write about, adding that the Governors in Nigeria have turned the local government to be the conduit pipe where governors perpetrate their corrupt practices mostly in Nigeria today.