By Godfrey AKON
Ahead of 2023 general election, the European Union, EU, Election Observation Follow-up Mission has visited the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, to find out about the commission’s implementation of its recommendations made after the 2019 general election.
Head of the EU Follow-up Mission, Maria Arena, who hinted on the purpose of their visit at the INEC Headquarters in Abuja, on Wednesday, noted that EU is a longstanding partner of Nigeria and supporter of the country’s democracy.
Arena, while expressing EU’s happiness to continue to support the country’s democracy, disclosed that the EU has launched its electoral support programme in view of the 2023 general elections.
“We are very proud and happy to have the opportunity to continue working with you, to continue supporting you and to contribute to improving the electoral process and system in Nigeria.”
“We are happy to see that with the newly signed Electoral Act, you will have important reforms for the next elections in 2023. This is really important for us to also see how INEC contributed to this electoral act and how you worked with important stakeholders like CSOs.
“We know that you have more time now to improve and implement the new laws. Having the laws is one thing but the implementation is more important. We think that INEC is really an important factor to improve on elections,” she said.
Responding. INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu said the commission has implemented most of the recommendations made by observers after the 2019 general election.
According to Yakubu, after the 2019 general election, the commission carried out a comprehensive review of the election observation reports by accredited domestic and international observers from the review, and also internally reviewed its processes and procedures and identified 178 recommendations, most of which have been implemented.
“Immediately after the 2019 General Election, we undertook a comprehensive review of the election observation reports by accredited domestic and international observers. Beyond that, we conducted our own internal review involving our regular and ad hoc officials and subsequently expanded it to include political parties, civil society organisations, security agencies, media organisations.
“From the review, we identified 178 recommendations. We then categorised them into three areas for the purpose of implementation. We have gone ahead to implement many of the recommendations that require administrative action by the Commission while working with the National Assembly on areas that require legislative action by way of amendments to the Electoral Act and the Constitution,” he said.
He expressed joy over the recent passage of the amendment to the Electoral Act into law, and explained steps that have been taken by the Commission since then to begin its full implementation.
“Happily, this meeting is coming only 5 days after the Electoral Act 2022, which contains many progressive provisions, was signed into law and barely 24 hours after the National Assembly considered wide-ranging amendments to the 1999 Constitution”.
He, however, admitted that “in many States we are struggling to achieve a more balanced distribution of voters to polling units”, but assured that “this is a priority project for the Commission which will be accomplished before the 2023 General Election.”
