…PDP, others pile pressure for presidential assent
President Muhammadu Buhari would assent the revised Electoral Act amendment bill in a matter of hours.
The president’s spokesman, Femi Adesina, stated this when he featured on Sunrise Daily, a Channels Television programme, yesterday.
“It could be today, it could be tomorrow; it could be anytime, but within the 30 days. It could be signed today; it could be signed tomorrow. In a matter of hours, not days. Hours could be 24 hours, it could be 48 hours; not days, not weeks.”
Adesina said the bill was forwarded to the president nearly a month after the National Assembly passed it.
He flayed critics accusing the president of delaying the signing of the bill, saying he still had up till March 1 to assent to the bill as prescribed by the constitution.
He said it will only be appropriate to say the president has acted against the law if he exceeds the 30-day window provided by the law.
“You know before the president will put pen to paper on any legislation, particularly this one that has to do with our electoral fortunes, it has to be looked at and looked at. He has to buy opinions from different stakeholders and having been satisfied that the necessary due diligence had been done and he will not be making any error, then he will sign it, and I tell you that Nigerians will get to hear about this bill in hours,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), yesterday, accused President Muhammadu Buhari and the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led federal government of plans to truncate the nation’s democracy.
According to PDP, the failure to sign the electoral bill into law had the capacity to derail the electoral system, truncate the nation’s democracy, subvert the corporate existence and turn the nation into another ‘axis of concern’ to the world.
Alerting Nigerians at a world press conference on a one-item agenda, which was the reworked Electoral Bill at the national secretariat of the party, National Publicity Secretary of PDP, Debo Ologunagba, said the refusal by President Buhari to assent to the Electoral Act Amendment Bill re-transmitted to him since Monday, January 31, 2022 by the National Assembly was a clear danger to democracy in Nigeria
He said this was after the legislature had acceded to and incorporated all his requests in the newly transmitted version of the Electoral Act Amendment Bill.
According to the PDP, “The refusal to sign the Electoral Act Amendment Bill is nothing short of a premediated and contrived “political abortion” of the will of the people as represented by the elected 109 Senators and 360 members of the House of Representatives, who unanimously passed the Amendment Bill in the first instance.
“The current stance of Mr. President further validates our Party’s position that the Buhari-led APC government is averse to free, fair, transparent and credible elections in our country, particularly, the 2023 general election.”
He said the PDP, therefore, wanted to draw the attention of Nigerians and the International Community to the situation.
He said on Thursday, February 17, 2022, Buhari addressed the EU-AU Summit in Brussel, Belgium, whereupon he called on the European Union (EU) to impose weighty sanctions on those engaged in “unconstitutional change of governments” as well as those influencing the “process and outcomes of elections”
Quoting the president, he said: “We also call for stronger support from the European Union in the condemnation and imposition of weighty sanctions on countries that engage in unconstitutional change of governments as well as manipulation of constitutions in favour of extension of term limits.
“It is, therefore, imperative for our partnership to also focus on strengthening election processes in Africa and prevent interference to influence the process and outcomes of elections.”
The PDP, however, stated that, “We urge the President to practice what he preaches.”
His words: “Mr. President’s refusal to sign the Electoral Act Amendment Bill constitutes an obstruction to democratic principle of credible elections. Any electoral process, which does not guarantee the free, fair and transparent transmission of election results from the polling units can only result in a government that lacks credibility and legitimacy which amounts to an unconstitutional change of government against the will of the people.”
Meanwhile, a coalition of Civil Society Organisations, CSOs comprising of over 24 groups, yesterday, converged on the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, to protest Buhari’s delayed assent to the re-worked Electoral Bill.
The protesters, who converged on the Unity Fountain in their numbers, were seen heading to the National Assembly Complex.
They were seen with different placards containing different inscriptions such as “Buhari, Sign Electoral Bill Now”; “Prevent Election Rigging”; “The Bill Protects the Voting Rights of PWDS” and “Buhari Save Our Democracy”, among others.
