As controversy continues to trail Saturday’s Presidential election, with many calling for the cancellation of the elections, the Nigerian Christian Elders Coalition (NCEC), has said the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) deliberately put the presidential poll in terrible disrepute, thereby, destroying the legitimacy of the election.
The NCEC, while addressing newsmen in Abuja on Monday, spoke vehemently against what it called antics of INEC and its Chairman, Prof Mahmoud Yakubu, specifically, in the flagrant abuse of both the Electoral Act 2022 Section 60(5) and the INEC 2022 Guidelines and Regulations for Conduct of Elections Clause 38.
The group maintained that INEC arrogantly sidestepped and bypassed its own rules, guidelines and principles set up by the commission itself for the 2023 presidential election and engaged in broad-day elections brigandage.
Speaking at the briefing, the leader of the group and Senior Pastor of Family Worship Centre (FWC), Sarah Omakwu, contended that the conduct of the presidential election fell below the threshold of a transparent, free, and credible election. Omakwu was joined by Associate Prof. Sam Amadi; Prof Haruna Dabin, and Reverend Austin Kemie, among others.
The group observed that “the failure to comply with the electoral law and INEC’s regulation and guidelines on the conduct of elections, particularly Section 60 of the Electoral Act 2022, and Clause-38 of the Regulation and Guidelines for the Conduct of elections 2022. These laws make it mandatory to electronically transmit the results of elections from the polling units.
“We, therefore, call on INEC to suspend further action on the election results and then explain to Nigerians the circumstances for this grave violation of the electoral law and the administrative actions it intends to take to rectify this breach of the integrity of the 2023 Presidential and National Assembly elections”.
