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EU VS FG: Clash Of Titans

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On February 25, 2023, Nigerians went to the poll to decide the successor of former President Muhammadu Buhari. In the early hours of March 1, the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Mahmood Yakubu, declared Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress as the winner of the election, announced that the defeated his Peoples Democratic Party and Labour Party counterparts, Atiku Abubakar and Peter Obi respectively. The two major oppositions have since then approached the Tribunal to challenge Tinubu’s victory, alleging that the election results were manipulated.

Releasing a final report monitored by over 50 independent observers, the European Union Observers, on June 27 alleged that the elections, most especially the one that produced Tinubu as president, were marred by problems that reduced public trust in electoral processes. In a 94-page report by the Chief Observer, EU Election Observation Mission, Barry Andrews, he noted that “the election exposed enduring systemic weaknesses and therefore signalled a need for further legal and operational reforms to enhance transparency, inclusiveness, and accountability.”

About four months after the presidential election, the EU EOM advised Nigeria’s electoral body, INEC, to pursue improvement in six major areas which are to remove ambiguities in the law; establish a publicly accountable selection process for INEC members; ensure real-time publication of and access to election results; provide greater protection for media practitioners; address discrimination against women in political life, and impunity regarding electoral offences.

The recent stand of the union has continued to generate reactions from Nigerians home and abroad. While it generated condemnation from the Presidency and INEC, major opposition parties and their candidates have used the opportunity to affirm their claims that the election was rigged in favour of President Tinubu.

The Federal Government on Sunday, while insisting that the election is the best organised general election since 1999, shredded the report as jaundiced. The president’s Special Adviser on Special Duties, Communication and Strategy, Dele Alake, described the report as “a product of a poorly done desk job that relied heavily on few instances of skirmishes in less than 1000 polling units out of over 176,000 where Nigerians voted on election day.” Alake added the FG strongly reject claims by “any organisation, group and individual remotely suggesting that the 2023 election was fraudulent”.

However, standard bearers of the PDP in the 2023 election, Atiku Abubakar and his Labour Party counterpart, Peter Obi, did not travel the same path with the FG on the issue.

Presenting Atiku’s view, the Special Assistant to the ex-vice president on Public Communications, Mr Phrank Shaibu, commended the EU report, adding that their camp has been justified that the result declared by INEC does not reflect the will of Nigerians who voted at the 2023 polls. Atiku bashed the presidency for rejecting the result adding that the truth cannot remain hidden forever.

Obi, on the other hand, the acting National Publicity Secretary of LP, Obiora Ifoh, alleged that INEC is loyal to the ruling party and not to the country. “Labour Party stands by the position of the EU observation mission. We have always said that this election was massively rigged in favour of the APC and their candidate. What the FG is saying is just medicine after death. Even the blind can see, the deaf can hear and they know this election was manipulated. Without sounding immodest, evidence was given at the tribunal, as you are aware,” Ifoh said.

Some notable Nigerians who spoke with AN24 in a telephone conversation have aired their views on the report, which has caused a stir between political gladiators in the country.

Past Chairman, West Africa Election Observation Network, Comrade Mashood Erubami

Executive Director, Centre for Human Rights and Ethics in Dvelopment (CHRED) and Past Chairman, West Africa Election Observation Network, Comrade Mashood Erubami, while contributing to the topic in an EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW with AN24 said the EU’s report is not enough reason to discredit the 2023 elections.

“I’m not sure that the EU has the right to condemn the elections in 2023, it is not within their portfolio to declare an election fair or unfair. They can only give a report on what they observed during the election and it is left for the people they are sending the report to take decision, whether it is credible or not. They have no right to condemn the election as fraudulent because the EU coverage of election observation is very limited, it cannot be used to determine the credibility of any election.

“The observers were sent here by the organisation that funded them. EU is an inanimate organisation. The team that came to observe the elections had Nigerians in it but they are so limited that their final result cannot determine the credibility of any election. That is why in all their reports, they have always added that it is not enough to determine the credibility of the election. They send representatives to check and scrutinize the processes. If from the pre-election up to the election time, they applauded INEC to have done well, the final report should not condemned everything is not credible.”

Furthermore, Erubami said only God is 100 per cent accurate, adding that there is some for minor erros.

He said, “Some people are complaining that they did not upload the result into the server like the Senate and House of Representative elections which held the same day, it could be so because we are talking of technology and they develop technical issues. The other document that will confirm and assert the report of INEC are there and all the local agents of the political parties are expected to sign and they did. It will not be fair on Nigeria as a country with its own sovereignty for a foreign organisation to condmen the holistically. They took money before they left their countries to observe and they must spend and account for the money. The area of accountability is the area of writing reports, which we all did when were there too.”

Presidential Candidate, All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Chekwas Okorie

The presidential candidate of All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Chief Chekwas Okorie, said INEC should have taken the corrections pointed out by the EU but expressed disappointment that the electoral body acted like a rival wife to the union with the response it gave. He added that the EU cannot say the election is fraudulent because it would mean preempting the Tribunal since the case is ongoing in court.

His words, “My view is not that EU described the election as fraudulent. For me, the report is more like a post mortem trying to tell us what ought to have been done to make the result more credible but it was not done. They pointed out a number of flaws in the election both in organisation and conduct of exercise and also advised on what ought to be done in future but I’m surprised at the reaction of both protagonists and antagonists of this matter. INEC reacted angrily to it, the presidency and the ruling party, APC also reacted along the same line while major opposition parties were hailing the EU report. If EU had gone ahead to declare the election as fraudulent, that would be tantamount to preempting the tribunal that is already set up by the government of Nigeria under our laws to determine whether the election had a substantial compliance with the electoral laws. I don’t think the EU set out to preempt the judicial process but what they did clearly was to point out the flaws in the election. And anybody in Nigeria will agree that a lot of things went wrong with that election.

“I was expecting INEC, not necessarily APC and the Presidency that are the beneficiaries of the result, to accept the report of the EU in goo faith and to assure that areas the criticism met would be considered in conducting subsequent elections. That would have been more mature instead of wanting to defend itself because we all do not need the EU report to know that a lot of things went wrong.”

He, however, commended the electoral body for some visible change in the just-concluded elections.

“There were also aspects where INEC did well. Some of the results that were declared during the presidential election were not expected but they were results that reflected the attitude of the people out there. Things that would never have happened in the past happened in terms of the results that were returned. The only area I feel INEC will find difficult to explain is how the result of the National Assembly elections got transmitted without any glitch and the critical one, which is presidential election, that all the mistakes occurred, yet the elections took place on the same date and time. They have not been able to give any satisfactory explanation, but I think we should focus on what we make out of the EU report and see how subsequent elections would be done better,” he lamented.

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