Worried by the inability of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to prosecute electoral offenses in the country, the INEC chairman, Prof. Attahiru Jega, yesterday called for the establishment of the electoral offences commission, adding that the legal unit of the electoral commission is not match for the barrage of electoral cases.
Jega made the plea when various youth organisations under the platform of Youth Alliance on Constitution and Electoral Reform, visited him over some complaints bordering on youth participation in the electoral process.
The INEC boss however announced that the postponement of the flag off of the national continuous voters register from its previous date of september to October saying it will enable the commission do a better job.
The youth group which was led by its national cordinator, Samson Itodo, expressed worries over lack of access to information from INEC, absence of youth data, impunity in perpetration of electoral offenses, failure of the federal government to prosecute killers if corp members in the post 2011 election after 26 days as promised, youth stereotyping, viable communication I terrace between INEC and citizens.
They however recommended that the commission commence early preparations ahead of the 2015 election, allow voters have access to information, develop a youth policy and for INEC to cause for a town hall meeting to hold between the commission and youths.
But in his response, Jega lamented that efforts by the commission at prosecuting electoral offenders is like a drop in the ocean, even though he added that the prosecution of electoral offenders was never done in the commission until he assumed office in June 2010.
Jega said “i have said repeatedly and I want to say it at this forum this commission has Jega stated this while hosting a coalition of youths under the aegis of Youth Alliance on Constitution and Electoral Reform, who visited the commission to lay their complaints over the of the 2015 elections. successfully prosecuted over 200 electoral offenders. Before we came in as a commission in June 2010′, there is no record of a single electoral prosecution of electoral offenders I this country. So we have done our best. But of course what we have done is like a drop in the ocean.
“And regrettably we do not have the capacity to successfully prosecute all the numbers of electoral offences. On voter registration alone which we did in January and February of 2011, we have close to a million clear cases of offenses.
” But we have a very small legal unit in INEC and at any time that legal unit is overwhelmed with either prosecuting pre- election cases or election tribunal cases or clearly legal work just on issues of election procedures and so on overwhelms our legal unit. And that is why we have done our best to prosecute more than any commission, we still feel that there is need for this electoral offenses commission, in order to drive the prosecution of electoral offenses.
“So it is not that we have not done any thing. We have done our best but clearly, our best is not good enough because we are also busy doing other things so this is one area where INEC can be unbundled. Somebody else can be given that kind of responsibility so that they can do it with appreciable result. We have done it but because it is a drop in the ocean people don’t think we have done anything.”
He further laid the blame for the delay in prosecuting, persons who killed NYSC members in 2011 post elections in some northern states on the judiciary and security apparatus.
Jega said “as we all know during he 2011 election an unfortunate thing occurred. There was post election vilone and many NYSC members lost their lives particularly in Bauchi and to some extent in Kaduna and Niger. It is regrettable and we have done our best. No body can compensate the loss of live so let’s not clearly talk about compensation. But we in INEC have done our best.
“Before the election we insured all our staff, adhoc and permanent. And unfortunately for those youth corp members, who were caught up in the killings we made sure all their insurance entitlements were paid. Along time ago far back towards the end of 2011. And I know for a fact that the federal government has done its best. We cannot like I said fully compensate for the loss of live but we and the federal government has assisted the families of those who either died or were involved. So to be honest I don’t know any single NYSC member who was. Not compensated for that unfortunate incident. If you have I formation on that give it to us we will take it up appropriately.
” We Pray it does not happen again but we are also taking proactive measure so that it does not happen again. It is not the responsibility of INEC alone. It is the responsibility of all stakeholders to ensure that we remove all over heating of the electoral process and the generating of conflicts and even violence that is often brought into the process by politicians.
He continued “On the issue of prosecution of those who have committed those atrocities, regrettably although the electoral act says INEC responsibility to prosecute electoral offenses, again I am not making any excises but what happened was post election violence we all know this. It is not violence that happened during elections the death of those corpers was as a result of post election violence, so really it is within the purview of the security agencies in terms of the normal arrest and prosecution and we have done our best.
“We do have what we call inter agency consultative committee on election, we have net periodically with the security agencies either before or after elections as well as to access what happens after election. And in this fora severally we have discussed issues of prosecution of those who have been detained for their participation in the post election violence in Kaduna, Bauchi and Niger States.
“I know that this issue we have taken it seriously and we have put pressure on those whose responsibility is it is to ensure prosecution and from what I have been told a few have been prosecuted and obviously they ate many and you know our court process, and regrettably low, the wheels of justice in Nigeria, regrettably grind too slowly. Certainly we must not allow people who have committed atrocities such as killing of innocent persons who participated in the electoral process to go scot free. We will continue to do our best to ensure that all those who participated in the act are brought to book.”
He further assured that the commission has taken a decision to prosecute “electoral offenses relating to voters registration towards the continuation of the voters registration.”
He said “We are preparing to do election in Anambra state, before Anambra election we will do continuos voter registration to update the register.
We have instructed legal officers in Anambra to commence prosecution of persons who have done multiple registration in Anambra state. So very soon you will hear that we are taking people to court in Anambra.”
On the shift in the National continuous voters registration, he said “we have re accessed our plans now, we will launch the nation wide continuous voters register sometime inOctober, not September as we planned, but certainly before the end of this year. And we will do that also till sometimes next year because we have to stop at a particular time before the election.”