All Electoral Disputes Will Be Concluded Before Swearing In – Reps

The House of Representatives has said efforts are on to amend the country’s Electoral Act to be in line with the desires of Nigerians.

The Chairman of the House Committee on Electoral Matters, Adebayo Balogun, said the 10th House introduced a bill that would ensure inclusivity and close all loopholes that contribute to electoral malpractices.

Naijaonpoint reports that Balogun stated this on Wednesday in an interview with Arise News. He stressed the commitment of the Tajueen Abbas-led House to serving the citizens through people-oriented laws.

He said the new electoral act when passed, would make room for diaspora voting, inclusion of persons with disabilities and guarantee women representatives in the parliament.

“We are Nigerians and naturally laws are expected to evolve and based on the circumstances that you find yourself. And one thing we’ve vowed in this 10th assembly is that under our legislative agenda, under the leadership of Right Honourable Tajudeen Abbas, we’ve agreed that we are going to give Nigerians, our dear country an electoral heart that will ensure free, fair and credible elections, ensure that all litigations are concluded before swearing in, and we’re going to ensure inclusivity as pertaining to age, gender, PWD, we’re even looking at the area of inmates voting. 

“I mean not too young to rule, and now the gender now too we want to, we are working towards this female inclusivity too, where we want to ensure that at least we have one member per state, in the House of Reps, and the debate is ongoing and I’m sure it’s going to scale through this time around.  It fail during the 9th assembly, we want to ensure that it sails true,” he said.

Early Voting for Essential Workers

The lawmaker representing the Ibeju-Lekki Federal Constituency further emphasized that inmates would be granted the right to vote in the new act.

According to him, essential workers, including security agents would be given room to vote earlier before the election day to ensure no one is disenfranchised.

“In the area of PWD too, people with disability, we’re doing so much to ensure that they have access to voting and there is no discrimination against them. Area of inmates too, some people are there for just minor offences and they are being discriminated against in their voting, so we are looking at a bill already to ensure that inmates are able to vote, they vote in Ghana, they vote in South Africa, in some other countries.

“And also essential workers, police, I mean yes, essential workers who are going to do early voting, to do early voting probably a week before the elections. These are areas we’ve already been looking at to ensure that there’s inclusivity in our electoral process,” he stated.

All Political Party Affairs Covered

The All Progressives Congress (APC) lawmaker added that all loopholes in the Electoral Act would be closed.

He disclosed that the bill would also address internal democracy in political parties. He stated that the electoral body, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) would be empowered in the new law to monitor party congresses and primary elections.

“And in ensuring some of these too, we want to ensure that we eliminate ambiguity in our laws, because we want to ensure that all litigations are concluded before elections, then we must reduce the litigation period, and by then we remove ambiguity in the electoral laws, then it will be very easy, because sometimes people go to court trying to test the loophole in the law, so we just waste credible time.

“We’re also looking at the area of internal democracy of the party, how the primaries will be more credible, and because most of the problems we have, most of the tribunals are more, I mean court cases are more about pre-election matters.

“After this amendment, all these issues will be sorted out, if there are going to be any congress or primaries, there must be laid out rules. This is where it’s going to be, the venue will be clear, the committee will be clear, the electoral committee will be clear, who should INEC recognize, and INEC will also be present in every congresses and primaries,” Balogun added.