Ruckus over NASS reordering of 2019 elections sequence

Background

Since the House of Representatives passed the 2010 Electoral Act amendment on Tuesday, January 23, 2018, there has been a lot of disquiet in the polity.  Senate had earlier on March 30, 2017 passed its own version of the amendment. The major concern of the political watchers is the reordering of sequence of election by the Green Chamber.  It will be recalled that the Independent National Electoral Commission had on March 9, 2017 announced the dates and sequence of elections and only on January 9, 2018 released a comprehensive schedule of elections.

According to the commission, the presidential and National Assembly elections will hold simultaneous on February 16, 2019 while Governorship, state assembly elections as well as Federal Capital Territory Area Council elections are to hold two weeks after on March 2, 2019. This was the same sequence the 2015 General Elections were held. However, the House of Representatives decided to reorder the elections as follows: National Assembly (Senate and House of Representatives), followed by Governorship and State House of Assembly and lastly the presidential election. The conference committee of both chamber of National Assembly decided to adopt the position of the House of Representatives and this was eventually adopted by the Senate in plenary on Wednesday, February 14, 2018.

At the Senate plenary of February 14, ten All Progressives Congress senators staged a walkout after expressing their displeasure with the way the Red Chamber was railroaded into adopting the position of the House of Reps  on the matter. The ten senators, who claimed that 59 of them were against the amendment, were Abdullahi Adamu (Nasarawa-West), Abu Ibrahim (Katsina-North), Abdullahi Gumel (Jigawa-North), Ali Wakili (Bauchi-South), Binta Masi Garba (Adamawa-North), Ovie Omo-Agege (Delta-Central), Umar Kurfi (Katsina-Central), Andrew Uchendu (Rivers-East), Benjamin Uwajumogu (Imo-North), and Abdullahi Yahaya (Kebbi-North). The senators took turns to criticise the adoption of the report without a debate. They also alleged that the amendment was targeted at the Office of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria currently being occupied by Muhammadu Buhari. The protesters equally cited irregularities in the signatories to the report.

I have had the privilege of discussing this nagging issue on Arise Television and NTA Network News. I have also discussed it in an earlier commentary published in The PUNCH of last Wednesday, February 14, 2018.

History of order of election since the Second Republic

Before reechoing my stance on this issue, let me take us on historical excursion on order of elections in Nigeria since 1979. I and a colleague, Kunle Animashaun, a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Political Science and Public Administration at the Fountain University, Osogbo jointly wrote an academic paper entitled “Experimenting with Staggered Elections in Nigeria” about four years ago. Our research findings show that the 1979 general elections were held in a staggered form. The elections ran between July 7 and August 11, 1979. The first poll to be held was election into the the Senate which took place on July 7, 1979.  Elections into the House of Representatives were held on July 14, 1979 while elections into the state Houses of Assembly were held on July 21, 1979. Gubernatorial elections to choose chief executives of the 19 states were conducted on July 28 with the presidential election coming last in the pack on August 11, 1979.

In 1983, the order was reversed. The presidential election took place on August 6. Gubernatorial elections were held on August 13. Senatorial elections followed on August 20 while elections into House of Representatives were held on August 27. The last in the log, elections in to state Houses of Assembly took place on September 3, 1983. In the aborted Third Republic, elections into the various offices, both at the state and national levels, took staggered form. Gubernatorial and state Houses of Assembly elections were held on December 14, 1991. National Assembly polls comprising elections into the Senate and House of Representatives were held on July 4, 1992. The presidential election was held on June 12, 1993.     The 1999 transition elections which were supervised by the military were also organised in a staggered manner. Governorship and state Houses of Assembly were held on January 9, 1999. The National Assembly elections followed on February 20 while the presidential election was held on February 27, 1999 bringing to an end the demilitarisation project of the Abdusalami Abubakar military regime.

In the 2003 elections, the National Assembly elections were held on April 12, 2003 while presidential and governorship elections were held on April 19, 2003. Elections into state Houses of Assembly were held on May 3, 2003. The 2007 general elections were conducted across a two-week period. Governorship and state Houses of Assembly elections were held on April 14, 2007 while presidential and National Assembly elections were held on April 21, 2007. The 2011 general elections were also conducted in a staggered form. Elections into the two chambers of the National Assembly were held on Saturday April 9, 2011 (the elections were originally scheduled for April 2). Presidential election was conducted on Saturday; April 16, 2011 (was postponed from its original date of April 9). Governorship and state Houses of Assembly elections were held on Tuesday, April 26, 2011. The last general elections held in 2015 were held in two tranches. Presidential and National Assembly elections were held on March 28, 2015 after being postponed from the initial February 14, 2015 while the Governorship and state Houses of Assembly were held on April 11, 2015 from the initially advertised February 28, 2015.

The Justice Mohammadu Lawal Uwais 22 member Electoral Reform Committee whose report was submitted to late President Umaru Musa YarAdua in December 2008 did make a recommendation for staggered elections in Nigeria. The ERC in its main report had proposed a two tier election system for the country.  The Committee in recommending staggered elections had proposed that elections into executive positions of the president and state governors should be held on same day at least six months to the expiration of their tenure while national and state assembly elections should be held two years after the executive elections.

Merits and Demerits of staggered elections

One major strength of staggered elections upon which the proponents of the electoral model have built their advocacy is the manageability and efficiency of the model. They argue that holding elections across periods will allow for better and adequate preparation by election management bodies to contend with the challenges of logistics during elections. For the proponents of staggered polls, the intervals between elections provide opportunity for electoral agencies to review their performance in a particular election and re-strategise for better performance in the next election   which ultimately enhances institutional efficiency of the election management bodies.

On a personal note, I am totally against it for the following reasons. First, it is against international best practices, it will increase cost of running elections and impact negatively on the economy as well as induce voter apathy. There has been the argument that when presidential election is held first, it creates bandwagon effect as voters may tend to vote for the party whose candidate has already won the presidency. Why that may be so, the question is, so what? The same order of election as the one advertised by INEC for 2019 favoured the incumbent party in power even though it was party in opposition as at the time of contesting the 2015 general elections. So, if something is not broken, why fix it?

My preferred choice is for all elections to be held in one day. As I observed in an earlier opinion on this issue last Wednesday, “I have my reservations on the reordering of sequence of elections by the National Assembly. To my own mind, it is self-serving. I do know that in section 25 of the extant Electoral Act 2010, the federal lawmakers exercised that power. However, we should be progressive rather than retrogressive. Why for instance can’t we have all elections in one day as is done in other climes? I have been privileged to observe elections in Ghana, America, Egypt and Uganda. Multiple elections are held the same day. In the August 8, 2017 Kenya elections, six elections into parliamentary and executive positions were held on that day. Why should we have elections over three different days when we could have all of them at once? Remember, when we have election here, we restrict movement and shut down the economy. Imagine the gargantuan loss the National Assembly recommendation will inflict on our ailing economy!  The advantage that having all the six elections on the same day gives is that it will save costs and logistical nightmare. It will also shore up voter turnout as against the current practice where there is voting fatigue.”

Former INEC chairman, Prof. Attahiru Jega, is on the same page with me on this. Jega at a public forum while still at the helms of affairs in INEC contended that staggered elections are costly. Besides, he noted that holding elections same day is in line with global practices. Jega’s words: “I think that in future, not 2015, elections should be held in same day in line with global practices and Nigeria should move in that direction in the future. Staggered elections are not cost effective and it is not cost efficient and it is expensive,” The INEC chairman cited Ghana, Sierra-Leone, the United States and Venezuela as countries that hold their elections in one day. If for any reason we however chose not to adopt this better practice, we should limit holding of general elections to just two days. If the federal lawmakers want to prevent bandwagon effect, they may want to have all but presidential election on one day and hold presidential election last on a separate date. That can be considered for future elections.

Quite unfortunately, the present imbroglio on the reordering of sequence of election is overshadowing all the other non-contentious noble considerations in the proposed electoral act amendment. With insinuations gaining ground that the president will veto the amendment, if the National Assembly fail to override the veto as was the case with the 2015 constitutional amendment exercise, then all the time and money spent on the amendment may go to waste. Some people are prodding INEC to go to court to test whether NASS has the power to order or reorder the sequence of election when section 15 of the Third Schedule of the 1999 Constitution had already vested the power to organise, undertake and supervise elections in the election management body. The challenge that poses is that giving the slow pace of the judicial process in Nigeria, the confusion and uncertainty over the legal framework for the conduct of 2019 elections will persist and that is not good for electoral planning. It is therefore important to quickly lay this issue to rest so that INEC can come up with a near accurate budget for 2019 general elections.

Jide is the Executive Director of OJA Development Consult. This piece has also been published today on Page 8 - 10 of LAWYER pullout in Thisday newspaper.