Date Published: 03/18/10

17 th March 2010.

Press release.

Remove Iwu Now!- Lagos AC Charges Acting President.

With the purported release of the 2011 election time table by the out going INEC chairman, Prof. Maurice Iwu, the Lagos State chapter of the Action Congress has, once again, reminded Acting President Goodluck Jonathan that any further day Iwu spends as INEC chairman mocks his stated commitment to electoral reform and warns that Nigerians may be forced to take extreme measures if the present government continues to play hide and seek with the universal demand for the removal of Iwu. The party says that what Iwu is doing presently is a mockery of the electoral process and a desperate effort to cling to a job he has horribly messed up since his unfortunate appointment five years ago.

In a release in Lagos, signed by the Lagos State Publicity Secretary of the AC, Joe Igbokwe, Lagos AC states that pretending that the universal demand that elections be concluded well in time so that electoral disputes could be settled before swearing in of elected officials does not matter in the purported time table, speaks volume of the doom that awaits future elections conducted by a heavily compromised partisan umpire like Maurice Iwu. It therefore demands that any worthwhile electoral process must be premised on adopting the Uwais Electoral Reform Panel report and removal of the unrepentant apostle of electoral fraud, Maurice Iwu as INEC chairman and constituting a credible electoral body that will restore confidence to the battered electoral system.

“We want to take the Acting President on his words that future elections in Nigeria would be credible. But we can’t reconcile such promise with the retention of all the vestiges of fraudulent and manipulated elections in office. We cannot reconcile the promise of future credible election with the rickety nature of INEC at present, which is not different from an outpost for the racketeering business of one man and few of his cronies. We do not believe that anything good can come out of the present INEC and we feel further dilly dallying as the next elections approach is proving very dangerous not only for democracy but the life of the country. This is the reason Jonathan should cease play-acting on the INEC issue but act decisively now to start restoring the confidence in the process, which took a terrible bashing as Iwu and company started fiddling with INEC for their selfish interests.

“Patronizing Iwu’s present pranks and antics like INEC workshop, release of election time table when he has few days to go, is not a way of furthering the ends of electoral reform and Jonathan should know that Nigerians are not fools. He should realize that if there is any public official Nigerians need to be offloaded from the system, it is a Maurice Iwu that shamelessly perverts elections to suit his inordinate ambitions. By now, he had known that Nigerians are fed up and tired of electoral chicanery and sees the removal of Iwu as the starting point for any credible election in the future.

“Lagos AC wants to remind the Acting President that Nigeria is practically hanging on tenterhooks and such critical issues as electoral reforms can do a lot from moving the country out of the present precipice while tolerating the mountains of malfeasances Iwu had pilled up at INEC will certainly lead to a doom for the entire country. We are aware of the heavy coterie of paid media persuaders Iwu had bought to further his inordinate ambition to remain as the vessel of electoral fraud in the country and we warn the Acting President that he would be held responsible should Nigerians be made to go through similar torture as we went through in April 2007. Let Jonathan heed the universal warning now and sack Iwu while empanelling a full and credible electoral body that should start now towards working for a general election in 2011, with the Electoral Reform Panel recommendations as a working instrument.”

Joe Igbokwe.

Publicity Secretary,

Lagos AC