Philip Umeadi, Commissioner for Publicity and Information, Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, will go for any excuse, no matter how ridiculous, to defend his employers
Double speak, bare-faced lies and obfuscation of otherwise simple issues have become ready tools employed by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, in its bid to cover up its glaring partiality and inefficiency in penultimate Saturday’s gubernatorial and state Houses of Assembly polls. These have especially been on display in the various press conferences addressed by Philip Umeadi Jr., INEC’s Commissioner for Information and Publicity in the run-up to and after the elections. For one, INEC’s press conference on 13 April, 2007 ended on a foul note as a reporter sought to point out some inconsistencies in the commission’s treatment of Senator Ifeanyi Araraume, Peoples Democratic Party’s governorship candidate for Imo State and Dr. Chris Ngige, the Action Congress governorship candidate for Anambra State.
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Specifically, the reporters had asked why INEC still went ahead to disqualify Ngige and Araraume contrary to court pronouncements. While trying to justify INEC’s action on Araraume, Umeadi said the commission was acting on a letter from PDP that it had no candidate for Imo State. He said the commission received the letter on 13 April. And though Ngige’s indictment by the Ignatius Ayua panel, on the basis of which he was barred from running, had been quashed by the court, Umeadi said INEC was yet to get an order to that effect. The fact, however, was that Ngige’s lawyer was in the commission’s office the previous day with the court order. But the personnel of the legal department of the commission refused to take the order from him, claiming that day was a public holiday. Rather, the counsel was asked to come back on Monday, two days after the gubernatorial election would have been held. Ironically, it was the same day INEC received the letter notifying it of the withdrawal of its candidate from the Imo gubernatorial race. The reporters pointed this out to Umeadi.
First, he denied that Ngige’s lawyers were ever in INEC’s Abuja office. When some journalists who saw the lawyer and indeed spoke to him confronted Umeadi with this fact, his reply was: "Why didn’t you lead him to my office?" This elicited laughter from the journalists, which enraged Umeadi, who thereafter refused to take other questions.
Another instance was when journalists took the commission up on missing photographs of candidates and party logos in the ballot papers used in some areas in the country for last Saturday’s polls. To Umeadi and the INEC Chairman, Professor Maurice Iwu, the candidates and the parties were to be blamed for the development. According to them, INEC had consistently asked the candidates to submit their photographs but they did not take the request serious. So, the non-appearance of the pictures of the candidates would teach them a lesson that whenever INEC asked them to do something in the future, it should be taken seriously.
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This position, however, was disputed by the candidates. Senator Isa Mohammed, who contested on the platform of Accord Party for the governorship of Niger State, told journalists on the day of the election that he submitted his photograph to INEC. Other candidates who had a similar problem said the same thing. INEC was to later change tune, this time claiming that it sent the ballot papers to the states without checking them. It was therefore no surprise that the Action Congress wrote the Commission last week requesting that its team be allowed to verify the specimen of the ballot paper for the 21 April presidential election to ensure that the name and photograph of the AC candidate, Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, had been included in the list in compliance with the Supreme Court judgment.
In the letter by its National Secretary, Alhaji Bashir Dalhatu, the AC urged INEC to make the specimen available to acquaint Nigerians with the form of the ballot.
The letter, dated 17 April and addressed to the INEC Chairman, partly read: "We are writing to you now to inform you that we are sending a team tomorrow to INEC to see the presidential ballot with his (Atiku Abubakar’s) name on it, and also to witness the destruction of the ballot that does not have his name.
"We are also asking that the Nigerian people are given the opportunity to view the ballot before the election. As you know, there was so much confusion regarding the ballot for numerous state elections, with some including names of candidates that INEC said it excluded, and others omitting names that the commission supposedly included.
"Some of that confusion would have been avoided if voters were allowed to see samples of the ballot before the election, as that would have permitted the correction of such mistakes.
"It is especially urgent that voters have an opportunity to view the presidential ballot in order to avoid mistakes that would further undermine the credibility of INEC."
But a statement by the party last Wednesday said, "INEC surprisingly refused to accept the letter."
This was just one instance in which the commission denied responsibility for the shoddy preparation for the elections. INEC has indeed been giving itself a pat on the back for a job well done, putting the blame for the glaring difficulties noticed during the polls at the door step of the police. Umeadi told journalists that 99 per cent of the problems noticed during the polls were as a result of inefficiency on the part of the security agencies. According to him, INEC did its best to conduct a free and fair polls but the security agencies did not allow it. "The assurance that we were going to conduct violence and fraud-free elections was based on the assurance we were given by the security agencies. But we are disappointed like most Nigerians that the security agencies did not live up to expectation," he said. But were the police or the Army also responsible for electoral materials that failed to get to their destinations on time, mix-up in the voters’ registers and other avoidable problems that were characteristic of the election?
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We Saw It Coming
TheNEWS’ earlier fears are confirmed by Maurice Iwu’s handling of the governorship and state Houses of Assembly elections
On Saturday, 14 April, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, conducted the governorship and state Houses of Assembly elections across the country. To the commission, its preparations for the elections were most appropriate and it boasted that it organised the best election the country ever had. But to the discerning, INEC’s claim was not only a farce, it could not have been otherwise, going by the shoddy preparations that gave ample indications that all was not well.
In particular, Professor Maurice Iwu, chairman of the commission, cut the picture of a man who could not be trusted with a responsibility as sacred as that which INEC was entrusted with. In two separate editions, TheNEWS magazine had chronicled various reasons why Iwu’s headship of INEC was likely to run the country aground.
In its 12 March edition, the magazine brought the question of Iwu’s credibility to the fore. The verdict it reached was that the INEC chairman is simply a lackey of the presidency and, by extension, the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) whose utterances were indicative of his servile disposition.
To many observers, Iwu’s servility was not unexpected, especially as he was appointed by President Olusegun Obasanjo without recourse to due process. For instance, when the Senate convened to ratify the appointment of the INEC boss on 1 June 2005, it was discovered that, contrary to the provisions of the 1999 Constitution that the President must consult with the Council of State before such appointment, no such consultation was made. "The 1999 Constitution makes it mandatory for the President to consult with the Council of State before appointing the Chairman of INEC.
"My investigation however shows that the presidency single-handedly chose Iwu," Senator Tokunbo Afikuyomi once told TheNEWS.
The belief that Iwu was a stooge of the presidency began manifesting early enough. Dr. Christian Okeke, a PDP candidate for the House of Representatives, went to court after INEC refused to award him a certificate of return and was granted his request. But Iwu ignored the order of the Appeal Court, fuelling speculations that he was acting the script of the Uba brothers, who are believed to be instrumental to his emergence as INEC chief. The reason was that the Uba preferred Jerry Ugokwe to Okeke.
Many other actions of his portray him as a hatchet man. One of them is his uncanny ability to select justice. Despite Okeke’s victory at both the election tribunal and Appeal Court, INEC preferred to hold on to his certificate of return. This prompted the intervention of Alhaji Bello Masari, Speaker of the House of Representatives, who issued a two-week ultimatum to Ugokwe to return all documents to the real winner. Okeke later took Iwu to the Appeal Court, Enugu Division on 31 October 2005, where the INEC commissioner was called to explain why he refused to obey court orders.
A similar episode recurred in the Senate, where Ugochukwu Uba fraudulently got elected.
Yet Iwu would not stop attracting controversies. In fact, his traducers are quick to point at his sense of travesty of justice, particularly in his "reversal of fundamental principles of granting political parties recognition."
Beyond Anambra and the South-East, Iwu is viewed with utter suspicion for his partisanship in virtually every politically decision involving President Obasanjo. A perfect example was the Plateau State recall process involving Simon Lalong, former speaker, Plateau State House of Assembly and Ibrahim Mantu, Deputy Senate President. Since Obasanjo wanted Governor Joshua Dariye out for evading prosecution in London over allegation of money laundering, Iwu needed to chase Lalong out through a recall.
But INEC was restrained from conducting the referendum in August 2005 by a Jos High Court. Still, Iwu went ahead with the referendum on 28 August, 2005. Iwu, however, lost in the bid to recall Lalong, who polled 74 per cent of the total 41,859 votes cast. This was the same Iwu who refused to invoke the recall process for Mantu whose Plateau Central district had submitted a petition to INEC demanding his sack. Mantu was reportedly spared the stress of a referendum because of his role in Obasanjo’s tenure extension saga.
Still, there are those who are yet to forgive Iwu for his meddlesomeness in the internal affairs of the Alliance for Democracy, AD, during the crisis that followed the party’s 2003 convention. Then, members of the AD had gathered at Onikan Stadium, Lagos for their convention. A team of INEC officials led by Dr. Ishmael Igbani had acted as observers and subsequently recognised Chief Bisi Akande as the chairman. But with the exit of Abel Guabadia as INEC boss, Iwu decided to recognise Mojisola Akinfenwa as factional chairman of the party.
There is also evidence of executive rascality on the part of INEC during the court case involving General Muhammadu Buhari, All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP) presidential candidate and Obasanjo. The commission exhibited this when it failed to produce some facts on electoral malpractices demanded by the Appeal Court.
Thus, as the April polls approached, Iwu appeared pressured to deliver as an impartial judge. Afenifere, the pan-Yoruba socio-political organisation, had in October last year, through its National Publicity Secretary, Yinka Odumakin, called on Iwu to resign. According to Odumakin: "By his utterances and actions, Professor Iwu has demonstrated to discerning minds that he is programming the nation for a sabotage of the 2007 elections."
In the same vein, the AC described Iwu as the most dangerous threat to the sustenance of Nigeria’s democracy. The party, which spoke though its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed on 13 February, warned the INEC boss to be mindful of his actions and utterances, as the nation prepared for last week’s elections.
But Iwu kept preaching his readiness to die to ensure a free and fair election.
"I have been personally harassed with the threat of violence and even death, just because I insist that there must be free and fair elections in 2007. They want to kill me because I am saying the time has come to stop the people who have manipulated the electoral system for so long," he said.
Yet, not many were impressed by his sermon. Last month, the AC warned him through a letter by Mohammed: "We are compelled, in view of the dangerous, illegal and unconstitutional ban being planned by INEC to warn that there would be no elections in April without Atiku Abubakar.
"If Iwu had any sense of history or propriety, he would have been treading carefully and be well above manipulation in carrying out his duties of organising an election that would not only be acceptable to the Nigerian people, but also to the entire world," the party said.
Though Atiku was cleared to contest the elections by the Supreme Court and Iwu promised to obey the order of the court and even made exigency plans for the Vice President, the complaints that followed the conduct of last week’s elections only confirmed Iwu’s indifference to travesty of justice.
Also, in our 26 March edition, we affirmed that Iwu’s bias was a threat to the credibility of the April polls.
In that edition, it was noted that as the polls approached, there was apprehension in the land. In other words, political analysts entertain fears that what happened in the 1963 general elections could be replicated. That year, the then electoral commission, led by Chief Eyo Esua, in concert with the dominant Nigerians National Alliance (the Northern People’s Congress, NPC, and others) engaged in large-scale disqualification, intimidation, probe and imprisonment of political opponents.
All these precipitated the crisis that heralded the military regime in 1966.
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