INEC in the eye of storm... by Ikenna Emewu

Ten days to the presidential and National Assembly elections, the storm is still gathering for the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Attahiru Jega. Although, the INEC boss had declared that he had no plan to resign his appointment, with four months to the expiration of his tenure, some forces still do not want him to conduct the elections.

Those against Jega accuse him of unholy alliance with the major opposition party, the All Progressives Congress (APC) and determination to ensure that power returns to the North. They say that with these allegations, the INEC chairman has lost the neutrality of an umpire. However, those in support of Jega say that the people against him do not want credible elections and see the INEC chairman as obstacle.

Amid all these are controversies about activities at the INEC.

Brickbats

Almost every PDP supporter believes and argues that for a clean election to prevail, Jega must be out of the way. To deepen the argument, Ekiti State Governor, Mr. Ayo Fayose, who has assumed the role of attacker-in-chief for the party, has asked President Goodluck Jonathan to order Jega to proceed on terminal leave, and that heaven will not fall if he does.

Fayose alleges that Jega is in alliance with the APC to skew the elections in favour of the opposition. While he canvasses this position, the APC spokesman, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, attacks back, saying that nothing should be done to remove Jega because he is needed there most.

Sometime last month, former governor of Anambra State, Dr. Chukwuemeka Ezeife, granted a press interview and said that no election should hold until Jega leaves office. Even in the PDP media publicity team, there have been several interests, saying that the only way to have credible election is to get Jega out of the way.

Beyond the attacks on each other by the parties, there are some others who feel Jega has weightier matters beyond the party interests, enough to make him leave office for another to conduct the election. In the document, they availed Daily Sun, there are many allegations against the INEC chief, some of which we made out time to crosscheck and investigate for clarity. While some of them are on mismanagement of the office, bias and favouritism, some are on alleged financial shortcomings. For these reasons, they posit that Jega should go before the elections would hold.

Playing into their hands

Like a game doomed, whereas Prof. Jega understands the warring interests are after him, he seems to be oblivious of what to do to put them at a spot. Instead of carrying on in a way that would shut up the forces against him, he seems to constantly throw up developments that might not help his case.

Sometime last year, INEC took a very wrong step in the allocation of fresh polling booths in the six regions. In the exercise, he allocated to Zamfara State alone the number of new centres he gave the five states of the South-east geopolitical zone. And the number the North-west got was more than those of the three geopolitical zones of South-east, South-south and South-west.

Zamfara State got 1,163 new polling booths, while the South-east had 1,167. Whereas the North-west got extra 7, 909 booths, the Southern states of three zones got 8, 414 booths, and the entire three zones of the North, including the insurgency ravaged North-east had 19,446. Until when the Senate intervened and stopped the heated argument on the continuation of that perplexing policy, Jega had stood his grounds on it and called the bluff of the entire South over allegation of injustice and intentional bias to favour the North and possibly ensure a northerner wins the election.

The original plan for the creation of those new polling units, clearly in favour of the North, was like a ground rule towards the implementation of the card readers for elections. With such multiple voting points up North, in a situation, where card readers are in use, it would be easier and faster to conduct elec­tions in the area by enabling more people to vote, unlike in the South, where fewer points were created. Jega’s silence and defiance over the complaints emboldened the PDP forces to raise their voices higher.

That step would not have assuaged Jega’s yearning for seeming imbalances in the affairs of the INEC until in late January when the commission released the number of Permanent Voters Cards, PVCs, in preparation for the elections in February. The three geopoliti­cal zones in the North already had an average of 80 per cent of PVCs. The South had less than 45 per cent on the average. Generally, at the time Jega announced postponement of the elections, even when he said INEC was ready, about 65 per cent of the distributed PVCs were in the northern region and the 35 per cent in the South.

When INEC announced postponement of the elections, there was a deficit of about 24 million PVCs in the South. This implies that about 35 per cent of the registered voters would have been disenfranchised had the elections held in February. And, ironically, three weeks after the postponement, the Commission still has not got all the cards across to the voters, with some of the worst affected states in the South-west region.

“Before we got to this point, Jega had car­ried on till middle of January like nothing was to be hurried up. The distribution, though in favour of the North, was so slow, until media reports alerted the nation, after which the president summoned Jega with a mandate to immediately make the cards available as soon as possible,” a PDP source said

The INEC structure brouhaha

The composition of the leadership and management of INEC is matter some believe shows bias. There is the controversy over the extension of the tenure of the immediate past Secretary of the Commission, Alhaji Abuba­kar Kaigama. INEC is accused of turning a blind eye to the natural successor and most senior director of the defunct Political Moni­toring Department, Mrs. Regina Omo-Agege from Delta State, South-south geo-political zone. The commission also redeployed the only three southern directors to INEC Elec­toral Institute and thereby relegating them to the background, making them redundant.

When the directors refused not to be frustrated, it was gathered, INEC conducted a restructuring and re-engineering, thereby edging them out. In the process, favoured candidates were appointed.

Among INEC nine Strategic Planning Committees chairmen, seven are from the North while two are from the South. They include Nuru Yakubu, Istifanus Dafloang, Mustapha Kuta, MJ Mohammed, KW Ukeugu, Torgba Nyitre and Emmanuel Akeem, all from the North, while Mike Igini and Okechukwu Ndaehe are from the South.

The headship of the five key committees of the Commission are also lopsided on the re­gions they come from. Logistics is headed by Col. Hamanga; Operations by Nuru Yakubu; Procurement by Ambassador Wali, whereas Finance and General Purpose and ICT Com­mittees are headed by Prof. Jega. Hajiya Amina Zakari heads Political Monitoring. All these heads are from the North. Four of them are from the North-west, Jega’s region. Two are from the North-east.

The South-west is entirely excluded from the hierarchical structure of key positions in INEC, with no Commissionership representa­tion.

The 15 key directorates of the INEC in 2012 were headed by: Jega (North-west), A. Kaigama (Secretary), who later retired in 2013 and replaced by Augusta Ogakwu, from the South-east; OF Usman, Director of Logis­tics and Transport; A. Mukhtar (North-west), Director of Finance and Accounts; Moham­med Kuta (North-central), Director of Audit (Internal Audit); Okey Ndoche (South-east), Director of Operations; Nyitse Torgba (North-central), Director of Monitoring and Elec­tions Performance; Mr. AA Adamu, Head, Commission Secretariat (North-central), A. Ekwunja (North-central), Director, Civil Societies, E. Omenger (North-central) and Director, Public Affairs; Regina Omo-Agege (South-south), Director, Political Monitoring; the position of Director of Electoral Institute was vacant then; RE Edogholu (South-south) was Director, Estate and Works, Chudi Nwa­for (South-east), Director of ICT and I. Rin, Director of Voter Education (North-east). The South-west had no director then until one was later appointed last year.

The elevation of the Internal Auditor and Director of Finance (both from the same State and geo-political zone) over and above their superior to occupy such a strategic position has not also gone down well at INEC. In 2012, a deputy director in legal services al­legedly failed the promotion examination but was retained and instead elevated to head a department over and above senior directors, who now report to him.

Allegation of favouristism is rife at INEC. Erstwhile Secretary to the Commission, Alhaji Abubakar Kaigama, who was appointed in 2005 for a five-year tenure, by 2010 was said to have exceeded the mandatory 35 years of service and 60 years age of retirement. He continued in office.

Also, the headship of six major commit­tees of the INEC, as appointed by Jega, tilts towards the North. They include: Logistics, headed by Hamanga Tukur (North-east); Operations, headed by Nuru Yakubu (North-east); Procurement, headed by Ambassador Wali, (North-west); Finance and General Purpose and ICT Committees, the two headed by Jega (North-west) and Political Monitoring headed by Amina Zakari (North-west)

Contract award headache

The award of contracts of N13 billion is causing ripples. Companies enumerated in the contracts of INEC include: VI Solutions, San Farno, a German/Polish firm, with a backer from the North; Graphic Inline (GI); TIP 3, a Spanish; Areo-Vote; Kalamazoo. These companies that secured the contract were all linked to northern promoters allegedly fronting as proxies for a certain ambassador, who is believed to wield so much influence on INEC from outside.

At the Wuse 2 in Abuja, INEC operates an office on a choice property, a twin-duplex close to a prominent hotel on Blantyre Street. The rent for the block has just expired and the INEC appears in quandary on whether to renew the tenancy or not, especially as Jega’s tenure would expire after the elections. While the commission rented, furnished and renovated the property, tongues wag that the property is owned by an INEC chief and the commission pays as much N300 million rent annually for use of the property.

Administration of the internal affairs of the INEC is controversial. Indeed, dumping of the Direct Data Capture Machines acquired at a huge cost of N74 billion, for electronic voting registration exercise is still causing some ripples.

INEC is said to have awarded the PVCs contract to ACT Technologies Limited, for N2.6 billion. The company, in turn, sub-contracted the production of the PVCs to a Chinese firm. Official records show that the contract was awarded since February 2013 in naira and was supposed to be executed within seven months. It was, however, immediately re-designated in dollars to the Chinese com­pany at US$140 million, at the then prevailing exchange rate. That was more than two years ago. With the recent spikes in the exchange value of the Naira, more than N3 billion may have been paid for this contract, owing to the delay.

ACT Technologies is said to have been paid, on February 14, 2013, N489, 937, 500, being initial payment for the production of the PVCs. The money was paid through JAIZ Islamic Bank. After this initial payment, other payments, totaling over N2.6 billion, were ef­fected to the Nigerian and Chinese companies for the fast-track production of the over 68.8 million PVCs.

Indulging parties

Administration of the internal affairs of the INEC is also a subject of scrutiny and issues have been raised on how the commission dumped the Direct Data Capture Machines it acquired at a huge cost of N74 billion for electronic voters registration after some controversy.

Due to weak enforcement by INEC, none of the registered political parties has been sanctioned for contravening the mandate of the commission. There is lack of effective and thorough monitoring of campaigns’ expendi­tures of candidates. Also, INEC has failed to sanction political parties over the conduct of party primaries with due disregard to internal democratic norms. In the last primaries, INEC got over 250 petitions. No action was taken by the commission, except waiting on the courts to so decide.

There are also wide accusations that the INEC registered underage persons as voters in the North, which is against the law.

In 2010, the defunct ANPP generated N493 million and expended N370 million in the same year. Defunct CPC pooled N331 million and expended N268 million. Labour Party generated over N95 million and spent N66 million while the defunct ACN pooled N6 million and spent over N5 million. The failure of Prof. Jega to allow registered political parties, who fail to live up to their constitu­tional responsibilities like monitoring of their finances and the composition of the member­ship registration to continue business as usual is largely responsible for the poorly organised state of political parties.

Again, the 2010 report (Financial Year Statement) of 63 registered political parties, membership register as well as other details was an eyesore compared with the claim of transforming INEC. The report revealed that majority of the registered political parties lacked the basic requirements, regarding the organisation of such platforms, with 90 per cent of them devoid of audited financial statements and comprehensive membership register.

Furthermore, seven registered political parties – Accord Party, Action Alliance, Justice Party, Peoples’ Mandate Party, Hope Democratic Party, Peoples Salutation Party and Democratic Front for Peoples Party failed to submit their reports to INEC for audit and thereby keeping INEC in the dark as regards their financial dealings in the 2011 fiscal year. No action was taken.

The card readers

In 2012, during the Ghana national elec­tions, INEC had sent officials to observe and understudy the country’s experiment, with the use of card readers in elections.

After the trip, the commission took a deci­sion to experiment the process in Nigeria. But the advice of the team that visited Ghana was that card readers would first be deployed in pilot areas, specifically the Federal Capital Territory Area Council election.

It was gathered that due to the lack of pre­paredness when the FCT election held, INEC could not continue with the experiment. That had to stay until the Ekiti and Osun guberna­torial elections, when it could not be put to test again because the commission was not sure of its success. But now, with a larger election, INEC insists on using card readers.

Card readers were used inVenezuela where the ruling party was defeated in the election and paved the way for the opposition. It was later used in Brazil’s election.

In Jega’s defence

Since the push against Jega started, there seem to be two sides to it – on one part, the removal campaign looks like a PDP project while the task to protect and make sure he remains there has been taken up by the APC.

This could be just part of the duty of the two to oppose each other or some other inter­ests being protected.

For instance, the National Chairman of the APC, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, had warned, two weeks ago, that any attempt to remove Jaga would have dire consequences on the forthcoming general elections in the country.

Odigie-Oyegun sent this defence when the job was like mere speculation, he had indicated that he doubted the reality of the in­tention because President Goodluck Jonathan had, even at the last presidential media chat, expressed his confidence in Jega.

He said: “I don’t think they can remove him. We have only three weeks, although President Goodluck Jonathan, keeps saying he has no plan to sack him, that is different from removing him. But we have only three weeks unless they don’t want an election.”

The APC chieftain explained that his party being at the forefront of the pro-Jega cam­paign did so in the interest of the nation.

To give support to that official position of the APC, senators of the party are also ac­cusing PDP and Jonathan of such plot and, at the last week of February, warned of the dire consequences of such plot.

Today, apart from a final word from Jona­than, the plot has gone beyond speculation as it gathers momentum everyday.

The forces aligned with Jega argue that PDP and indeed all that call for Jega’s removal see him as obstacle to their plan to rig elections and want him out at all costs to have their way. Their argument is that PDP is not comfortable with Jega, especially for his insistence on the use of card readers for the elections.