This comes as election campaigns officially kick off on Wednesday, September 28 and are expected to last for five months.
Nigerian lawyer, Kayode Ajulo, has warned Nigerian politicians and political parties against disobeying the provisions of the Electoral Act 2022, especially regarding the conduct of campaigns ahead of the 2023 general elections.
Ajulo reminded candidates contesting various positions in the forthcoming elections that by virtue of the Electoral Act provisions, a lot of restrictions have been placed to prevent the usual electoral malpractices that start even from the period of the campaign.
This comes as election campaigns officially kick off on Wednesday, September 28 and are expected to last for five months (150 days) as provided in Section 94(1) of the Electoral Act 2022.
However, Ajulo noted that though political parties would have ample time to rally their faithful and garner new converts before the polling day, they must strictly abide by the law as the Act has changed the game of politicking in the country.
President Muhammadu Buhari signed the new electoral bill into Electoral Act 2022, on February 25 this year to repeal the Electoral Act 2010.
Sections 92, 93, 94, 95 and 96 of the new Electoral Act have prohibitions with penal consequences for campaigns in places of worship, palaces, and places with public offices. There are also consequences for intimidation, vote buying, rigging, forgery of ballot papers, ballot box snatching and other electoral malpractices.
Section 92(3) says, “Places designated for religious worship, police stations and public offices shall not be used for political campaigns, rallies and processions; or to promote, propagate or attack political parties, candidates or their programmes or ideologies.”
Ajulo said “by the above provision prohibiting the use of public offices for election campaigns, it is therefore safe to submit that the palaces of our traditional rulers that are funded and maintained with public funds are categorized as public offices”.
He noted that Section 92(1) of the Act provided that a “political campaign or slogan shall not be tainted with abusive language directly or indirectly likely to injure religious, ethnic, tribal or sectional feelings”.
According to Ajulo, based on the provisions of Section 92 of the Electoral Act 2022, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) expects political campaigns to be “civil, devoid of abusive language and without any rancour”.
“The Act also enjoined political parties and their candidates to comply with these provisions as contravening them will attract sanctions as any political party, aspirant or candidate who contravened Section 92 of the Act would be fined N1 million or 12 months imprisonment,” he added.