- Ruling Ignites Calls For Electoral, Judicial Reforms, INEC Overhaul
- Experts Frown at Courts Determining Elections Outcome
- Confidence in INEC, Judiciary Falls to All-time Low Over Corruption
- Future of Nigeria Bleak Without Restructuring – Southern/Middle Belt Leaders
October 29, (THEWILL) – The pains are real, even though losing and winning are inbuilt in any contest, not to talk of political contests in Nigeria that allow the winners to take all.
So, after the end of litigations on the outcome of the February 25 presidential poll at the Supreme Court on Thursday, October 26, 2023 with the affirmation of Bola Tinubu as President of Nigeria, the dismissal of the issue of 25 percent requirement for Abuja, as well as the claim that non-transmission of the poll by the Independent National Electoral Commission affected the outcome of the poll, the bile is still flowing, understandably.
“We are still in shock about how everything came out at the Supreme Court,” Labour Party spokesman, Obiora Iloh, told THEWILL on Friday when he was asked what next after the apex court ruling and its impact on ongoing democratisation in the country.
He continued, “We have just finished at the Supreme Court. It is our intention to spend time digest everything that transpired there. We would want to reflect on the events of the past few months as a political party and take a stand. For now, what our National Chairman said on the apex court ruling will suffice until the party leaders come together and take a definite position.”
Iloh’s counterpart in the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Debo Olugunagba, said something slightly along the same line.
“We will have to get a report of the court ruling before we take a decision on the way forward on the polity.”
Even so, both political parties rejected the apex court ruling in strong words on that Thursday.
LP National Chairman, Julius Abure, described the court’s final ruling as a mark of institutional failure.
“…Our institutions are not working and we may be sliding into dictatorship. It is very clear that the executive has hijacked both the judiciary and the legislature. This is so unfortunate for our democracy in Nigeria and it is even more for the people of Nigeria,” he said, among others.
The PDP also disparaged the Supreme Court ruling because it did not, “uphold the provisions of the law, instead it trashed the expectations of the majority of Nigerians who looked up to it as a temple of impartiality…”
“If the verdict had been in their favour, the PDP and LP would have hailed the judiciary as the saviour of democracy,” said the spokesperson of the governing All Progressives Congress, APC, Felix Morka, on Friday. “Nigeria is made up of 200 million people. Those who want to disagree will do so, but I think quite frankly that the courts of law have acquitted themselves well. INEC, they said, conducted the election under existing laws.”
Many party members and supporters have towed the lines of their party in their reactions, mostly on social media, though some PDP governors like Seyi Makinde of Oyo state and his Bayelsa counterpart, Diri Duoye, joined some of their APC counterparts to visit and congratulate President Tinubu on his victory in Aso Rock.
For Professor of Political Economy at the Lagos State University, Sylvester Odion-Akhaine, the Supreme Court judgement is good for democracy.
“The Supreme Court is good for democracy. The judiciary is the last resort in the operationalization of the rule of law,” he told THEWILL in a brief interview.
Odion-Akhaine said that despite the opinion of bias alleged against the judiciary which are “ideas in the head of people,” the outcome, in his consideration, is the momentary “possibility within the ambit of the rule of law, adding that the “judiciary works with the grundnorm and not otherwise.”
According to him, “public opinion matters. Wherever merit exists, it should not be discounted, but rather harnessed for the consolidation of our democracy.”
IMPORT OF RULING FOR DEMOCRATISATION PROCESS
Unlike previous elections in Nigeria, the 2023 general poll, with a reformed Electoral Act and young demographic, held a promise of real change for many seeking national cohesion amid separatist agitations and self-determination, worsened insecurity and mass poverty. The failure of INEC to conduct the poll according to its promised laid down criteria raised public suspicion of complicity with the establishment to hijack the poll.
Thus, at the conclusion of the election and with INEC’s declaration of Tinubu as President, the three major political parties which shared the total votes of 21.87 million at 8.79 million by APC, 6.98 million by PDP and 6.1 million by LP finally got the law court to settle the matter, first through the Presidential Election Petition Court, PEPC, on September 6, 2023 and finally at the Supreme Court on October 26, 2023.
“Among others, not a few political watchers and legal pundits had believed that 25 per cent votes in the Federal Capital Territory was mandatory for a presidential candidate to be declared the winner, but the apex court had disagreed with this interpretation, ruling that Tinubu had, of legal fact, met the required threshold of winning 25 percent of the votes in two-thirds of 36 states and Abuja combined.” General Secretary of the Conference of Nigeria Political Parties, CNPP, Chief Willy Ezugwu, said in a note to THEWILL, adding, “The new legal interpretation is now the law until the apex court says otherwise in a similar case in the future. We therefore congratulate the President and urge him to do justice to all Nigerians and leave a positive legacy as a unifier…”
Expatiating on the import of the apex court ruling for the democratisation process, Professor Odion-Akhaine, who is eyeing the governorship of Edo state in the forthcoming September 2024 poll, said that since democracy is a process, the Supreme Court judgement on the presidential election should enrich jurisprudence in Nigeria.
According to him, “while the judiciary acts within the extant laws, some of the issues which have implications for electoral credibility can be inputted into the electoral reform process.”
Human Rights lawyer and a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Femi Falana, welcomed the judgement of the apex court but, however, expressed regrets that the country still has a long way to go in terms of conducting elections that meets the yearning of Nigerians for free choice and fairness.
Speaking on national television on Friday, he said, “No doubt, the judgment of the Supreme Court ascended the electoral contest as far as the presidential election conducted in February this year is concerned, but for sure, it is not a judicial endorsement of the conduct of the election by INEC.
“What I mean is that even with the judgment, it is very clear that Nigeria has a long way to go in terms of ensuring that credible elections are conducted, elections that will be devoid of acrimony, elections that all of us will be proud of, but we are still a long way from there even with the judgment.”
MAJOR ISSUES RAISED BY PETITIONS AT THE LAW COURTS
As identified by Professor Odion-Akaine, some of the crucial issues raised by the election petitions and which are crying for reforms were the sanctity of the votes cast at each election and the role INEC plays in the process and the polity. Others are the period of litigation and the involvement of the three, separate but mutually interdependent arms of government, namely the executive, the legislature and the judiciary.
Former President of the Nigerian Bar Association, Dr Olisa Agbakoba, on Friday evening said that now that the Supreme Court had passed the final judgement on the 2023 presidential election last Thursday, there is urgent need to rejig the Judiciary, unbundle INEC and amend the laws governing the electoral umpire and devolution of power from the Federal Government to the states and local government councils.
In the estimation of the Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN, INEC has so serially bungled the election that it must be restricted from taking part in election petitions and to conduct elections only, with the mandate to transmit election electronically through a platform whose figures can be tendered in law courts in the place of human witnesses.
He called on the Judicial Council of Nigeria to help strengthen the judiciary and encourage judges to pass judgement without fear of favour, while the National Assembly should consider amending the law so that election petitions must be concluded before the victor assumes office.
“We need to strengthen the Judiciary, INEC and evolve a political culture that encourages citizenship and inclusive governance, but above all, we must devolve power from the centre to the units so that each state can use its resources for development rather than go every month to Abuja like a beggar, “ he said.
Agbakoba submitted that the devolution of power from the Federal Government to the states would ensure proper balance, arguing that as presently constituted, the Nigerian centrifugal system confers weirdly power on the President to the disadvantage of the state governors and local government councils.
“Power has to be restructured so that state governors should not be at the mercy of the President.” Agbakoba said.
CNPP’s Chief Ezugwu agrees with Agbakoba on the need to amend the law to allow for the dispensation of election petitions before the declared winner assumes office.
“If we do not reform our electoral laws to make it mandatory for the laws courts to finish all petitions before the winners assume office, there will be no significant change, nobody appointed or whose appointment can be terminated by the victor would dare to overturn the election that his principal has won.” he said, adding, “Those who are benefitting from the rot in the system will kill and initiate change.”
Morka agrees. “Our party remains committed to reforming our electoral process. The immediate past President, Muhammadu Buhari, did it and we will continue to do so to ensure the conduct of elections under the law,” he said.
For President Tinubu, who welcomed the Supreme Court ruling with optimism about the future of the country, the “electoral jurisprudence and constitutional democracy are further consolidated and embedded more indelibly in our national identity…”
Urging Nigerians to set aside any differences that divided them and close ranks in support of his administration because “we are all members of the same households,” he said the apex court judgement has energised him to deliver on good governance, service delivery that would meet and exceed the expectations of all Nigerians.
Leaders and elders of a large section of the country, comprising the South-East, South-West, South-South, and Middle Belt geopolitical zones under the aegis of the Southern and Middle Belt Leaders’ Forum think that democracy as a government of the people, by the people and for the people may continue to elude the country if it was not restructured.
In a communique issued on Friday after their meeting, the leaders in a meeting chaired by Chief Edwin Clark,and attended by the leader of Afenifere, Chief Ayo Adebanjo; President-General of Ohanaeze, Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu; President, Middle Belt Forum, Dr Pogu Bitrus; and, National Chairman, PANDEF, Senator Emmanuel Ibok-Essien, called on the Federal Government to restructure the country immediately.
They said, “Without restructuring, the future of Nigeria and democracy remain bleak. It must, therefore, be carried out immediately.”
NEED FOR JUDICIAL REFORM
The call for judicial reform as a way to improve and strengthen the rule of law and independence of the judicial arm of government in the country received a major boost last week.
Retiring Justice Musa Dantijjo Mohammed in his speech delivered at the valedictory session held at the Supreme Court in Abuja on Friday, October 27, 2023 called for reform of the apex court as an institution. According to him, the statutory powers vested on the Chief Justice of Nigeria are enormous and are being abused.
He said, “As presently structured, the CJN is Chairman of the National Judicial Council, NJC which oversees both the appointment and discipline of judges, he is equally chair of the Federal Justice Service Commission, FJSC, the National Judicial Institute, NJI, the Legal Practitioners Privileges Committee that appoints Senior Advocates of Nigeria. In my considered opinion, the oversight functions of these bodies should not rest on an individual.”
He said that though the Constitution provides for the inclusion of the next most senior justice of the apex court as Deputy Chairman of the NJC, the “CJN does not consult his deputy on anything.” In the exercise of these powers, the CJN, he said, failed to fill the required vacancies of justices who have either died or retired, leaving only 10 out of the Constitutionally required 21 justices. Particularly hit by this deliberate omission are the Southeast and Northcentral, whose vacancies were created by the deaths of Justices from those geo-political zones.
“To ensure justice and transparency in presidential appeals from the lower court, all geo-political zones are required to participate in the hearing. It is therefore dangerous for democracy and equity for two entire regions to be left out in the decisions that will affect the generality of Nigerians. This is not what the law envisages..”
Amos Esele is the Acting Editor of THEWILL Newspaper. He has over two decades of experience on the job.
