INEC, VCP And Build-up To 2015 Elections

Uzo Chikere

February 2015 is like across the road. This year in question is about elections in Nigeria, the country with largest number of black people in the whole world. But as the citizens and in deed, the international community look forward with trepidation to this all important political exercise designed to make informed choices of individuals trusted up by their political parties as leaders and representatives, the establishment saddled with the responsibility to midwife the process, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), in recent time has appeared to be exhibiting in many of its steps abject lack of responsibility in that regard.

From what stakeholders in the Nigerian political arena have termed INEC’s shoddy disposition to the handling of the issuance of the Permanent Voters’ Card, it would appear to many Nigerians who had trooped out to the various polling units to collect their cards without qualms, that the national electoral empire might still be grappling with the challenges of being weaned, and therefore not mature enough to be entrusted with a task of such magnitude. Again, with the Professor Attahiru Jega- led INEC not being able to realize that preparations for the next general elections after 2011 would have started instantly with the commission firing on all cylinders, observers hold, casts doubt on its seriousness about ensuring that a credible, free and fair election would be achievable under its guidance in 2015.

If all that transpired in the process of collection of PVC which ordinarily should have been the end result cum conclusion of earlier registration exercise can be anything to go by, the inescapable summation is that INEC could possibly be confronted with an overwhelming scenario when the 2015 elections matrialise. Given that INEC has, and draws up the time-table for elections in the country, and appearing to have been caught unawares with the distribution of the PVCs is an indication that the electoral body might have lost its sense of responsibility or that the whole essence of its mandate to conduct and regulate all elections and electioneering process has been lost on the body.

From INEC’s conduct of the PVC distribution across the states of the federation which was done in three staccato phases, coupled with the citizens’ harrowing experience during that exercise, the disposition of the electorate to the up-coming polls can only be conjectured. In Lagos for instance, those who sought to obtain their PVCs found no INEC official at many of the polling units where they had registered in 2011 on the first day of the exercise. On the second day of the exercise initially slated to last from November 7 to 9, 2014, there were large crowds of enthusiastic residents of Lagos eager to collect their PVCs. But their disappointment knew no bounds as they met with myriad of discrepancies ranging from outright loss of data due to what the officials at polling unit 039 in Mende Maryland, attributed to system crash to insufficient supply of the PVCs by the company to which INEC contracted the printing others.

Frustration set in along the line as a lot of persons swore to abandon the exercise even if it meant being disenfranchised.         

There are those who feel that the Slovene and lackadaisical manner that characterized INEC’s distribution of the PVCs, especially in the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC)-ruled states was a deliberate plot to disenfranchise the residents in such states as well as set the stage for rigging by the ruling PDP.

In his reaction to the development, Governor Babtunde Raji Fashola of Lagos State where the exercise had to be postponed as well as done in two batches accused INEC of foul play. He maintained that:    “This is because by omission or commission, INEC has decided to make this a painful experience for us in Lagos by announcing that it will only issue Permanent Voters’ Card in (Eleven) Local Governments.”

INEC  had decided to distribute the PVCs in the first instance, in such local governments as Agege, Ajeromi-Ifelodun, Ifako-Ijaiye, Ikeja, Mushin, Lagos Island, Lagos Mainland, Ibeju-Lekki, Ikorodu, Kosofe and Ojo, while postponing the exercise in nine local government areas, which include Alimosho, Amuwo-Odofin, Apapa Badagry, Oshodi-Isolo, Epe, Shomolu, Surulere and Eti-Osa.

It then promised that it would conduct the exercise on November 28, 29 and 30 of, 2014.

Fashola further lamented: “I can only imagine the level of disappointment that you must all feel, having waited anxiously for this exercise and in spite of the fact that we had declared a work-free day.I am deeply disappointed at this display of lack of planning that speaks volumes of the contempt and disregard of this national agency for the rights of citizens. I wish to recall that it was INEC that first announced that this exercise was planned for August, and later shifted to September, and later to today and yet they did not get it right. If this is a foretaste of what we should expect in the general elections, for me, it is a bad start. It tastes awful.”

The appalling performance of INEC in the distribution of the PVCs which not only frustrated would-voters in the impending 2015 pols, but reached the point of incensing Lagos residents who angrily but peacefully protested against what some stakeholders perceived as a subtle plan by INEC to rig the up-coming elections especially in states controlled by the All Progressives Congress, APC, which informed the hoarding of the PVCs from getting to the people.

In listing the problems associated with exercise across the states, the national Leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Tinubu expressed suspicion over the development, pointing out that INEC was on purpose colluding with the Presidency to rig the elections to the advantage of the ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP) through delay in delivery of Permanent Voters Card.

He also raised questions concerning the eligibility of INEC to conduct a free and fair election going by the shoddy manner in which it conducted the distribution of the Permanent Voter Cards to eligible voters.

Tinubu lamented that “INEC had four good years to prepare for the coming 2015 elections and there are laws, particularly constitutional and electoral act requiring certain actions to be taken.”

He further stated: “They gave us temporary voter cards to vote in 2011 and now decided that there will be permanent voter cards consistent with biometric verification devices to improve on 2011 and make 2015 verifiable and show an improvement over the past record consistent to the standards across the

world. INEC told us that they are ready. They said they have put everything in place. They gave us the date only to discover 48 hours ago that they are not even ready for the 20 local governments recognised by INEC in Lagos State.

“They gave us the date only to tell us that only 11 local governments will be ready. Rather than outright boycott, the party endures the frustration and appeal to the public to continue with the 11 local governments. Our field reports, personal experiences and from what we observed so far, the exercise even in the so-called 11 local governments, the exercise failed and it is unacceptable. In some instances, we don’t find INEC officials in some of the accredited booths, we don’t find them arriving on time, the cards were not sorted, were inadequate, where are they? To me, this exercise has failed. It is not acceptable. We will consider it as a rigging exercise. INEC has colluded with the Presidency to rig this election from the data.”

In all of this, INEC appeared to be bereft of sound defense for its outing during the PVC distribution in the country. When contacted on phone about people’s experience in Lagos with the exercise, spokesman to INEC boss, Prof. Attahiru Jega, Kayode Idowu, could only ask The Union to send him an SMS stating the problem so that he could furnish the staff on ground with the development.  

Although INEC later admitted that Permanent Voter Cards distribution was shoddy in Lagos, it offered that the loss of the data of no fewer than one million people who registered to vote in Lagos State was partly responsible for the poor distribution of the cards.

In view of the repeated irregularities that mired the distribution of the Permanent Voters’ Cards across the states as well as INEC’s proven inconsistencies in the management of its attendant crisis, it is uncertain that the commission has the promise of delivering sound and acceptable elections in 2015.