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APRIL 9, 2007 VOL. 20. NO 26

Short-cut to Third term(?)

**Adebayo Adefarati**

With the death of Adebayo Adefarati, Alliance for Democracy (AD) presidential candidate,the privilege to determine when the presidential elections would hold now rests squarely on President Olusegun Obasanjo and Maurice Iwu, the INEC boss
By Tony Egbulefu, Abuja
huge setback on Thursday, March 29, befell the on-going process of political transition, following the death of Adebayo Adefarati, the Alliance for Democracy (AD) presidential candidate for the April 21 election. With Adefarati’s demise, the transition process and the general elections is now inevitably headed for an elongation as stipulated by the 2006 Electoral Act.
Section 37(1) of the Act stipulates that “if after the time for the delivery of nomination papers and before the commencement of the poll, the nominated candidate dies, the Chief National Electoral Commissioner or the Resident Electoral Commissioner, shall being satisfied of the fact of the death, countermand the poll in which the deceased candidate was to participate and the commission will appoint some other convenient date for election”.
While there is the likelihood that the April 14 elections would hold on schedule, that of April 21, which involves the presidential election in which Adefarati was to be a contestant, would have to be deferred to any date which Professor Maurice Iwu, chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) deems convenient.
In the event of such a postponement, many fear that President Obasanjo may likely get his enduring tenure elongation quest through a shorter cut. For instance, if Iwu decides to shift the presidential election to a date beyond June 2, Obasanjo would have no National Assembly to stop him if he decides to rule ad infinitum. This follows from the fact that the current National Assembly, inaugurated on June 2, 2003 would cease to exist by June 2, this year. Before Adeferati’s death, there had been subtle moves in the National Assembly to push up the handover date to October 1.With his death, INEC may now have to conveniently deliver the coup d’ grace.
At the Eagle Square Presidential rally of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) last Thursday, President Obasanjo, who disrupted proceedings of the rally to announce Adefarati’s death, described it as “breaking news.” Though he asked everyone to stand up before he made the announcement, the customary one minute silence was not observed for Adefarati. The president, however, regretted that the demised former governor of Ondo State did not live to see how the presidential contest would have gone. He described him as an illustrious citizen of the country.
Efforts to get Philip Umeadi Jnr, INEC’s Commissioner in-charge of Information and Publicity to speak on the direct effect of the death of the AD presidential candidate proved abortive. As at press time last Thursday, all he could tell The Source was that AD would have the opportunity to replace Adefarati. “ We will give them an opportunity to substitute their candidate in line with the constitution”, Umeadi told The Source in a text message. Adefarati had slipped into coma last Saturday and was immediately rushed to an undisclosed private hospital. Soon after, he was moved by his family members to the Federal Medical Centre (FMC), Owo, Ondo State, where he was admitted, with Dr. Alaba Omotola commencing treatment on him. His admission led to the postponement of the commencement of his presidential rally in Ibadan the following day, Sunday, March 25.
Unconfirmed reports have it that the sugar level in Adefarati, 76, became too high and caused him to blackout. At the private clinic and the FMC, he had to be hooked onto artificial respiration. Though Adefarati’s health was gradually stabilising by early last week, he passed on at about 1.30 pm last Thursday. Before his death, however, his son Gboyega Adefarati, had dismissed reports that his father was diabetic. According to him, his father has never been a diabetic patient.
Ayo Fadaka, Special Assistant to Adefarati, also said before he died that the late AD presidential candidate was merely suffering from exhaustion as a result of lack of adequate rest. He said those who believed that Adefarati’s sickness was fatal, were only wishing him death so that the elections would be postponed, and for the fear of losing the election to him.
Though the AD has lost its presidential candidate and the possibility of postponement of the presidential election starring Nigerians and the polity in the face, Senator Mojisola Akinfenwa, national chairman of AD who spoke a day before Adefarati’s demise, Wednesday March 27, advised INEC not to latch on what he termed “Adefarati’s health,” to postpone the elections. For Akinfenwa, all the elections, despite Adefarati’s health must hold on schedule.
As uncertainty shrouds the general elections, more with Adefarati’s death and the alarm raised by Umeadi last Wednesday that the April elections may not afterall hold as a result of the myriad litigations that have suffocated the electoral process, the possibility of an emergency reconvening of the National Assembly looms large. The national legislators vacated two weeks ago, with the senate slating the date for its memebers to reconvene on May 2, after the elections.
Sources, infact, indicate that the National Assembly may soon reconvene to amend the Electoral Act and abridge the blank cheque the Act gives the INEC chairman to determine the length of election postponement in the event of death of a presidential candidate. Aside this, Muhammadu Buhari, the presidential candidate of the All Nigeria People’s Party(ANPP), had last week made spirited calls on the National Assembly to reconvene and amend the Electoral Act to accommodate the period of extension for the voters registration. This period in which INEC claims it registered over 50 million voters, was not accommodated by the Act, and Buhari fears that it is a lacuna aggrieved losers in the elections can latch on and seek for the nullification of the entire process in the courts. According to Buhari, this is because the over 50 million voters which INEC said it registered within this period were not provided for in the Electoral Act and so can be termed illegal voters unless an amendment is effected on the Electoral Act to cover the period of the extension and the voters registered within the period.
Pressure to reconvene the National Assembly is also coming from the president’s foot soldiers in the presidency and the National Assembly over the report and recommendations of the Umaru Tsauri Review Committee of the Senator Ndoma Egba Ad- hoc Committee on the Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF), which indicted President Obasanjo and Vice President Atiku Abubakar and recommended both for trial in the Code of Conduct Bureau. Angry that the Tsauri Review Committee seemed to set its mind on smearing the president, in order to pacify his estranged deputy, Obasanjo’s loyalists are determined to pull every string to ensure that the recommendations of Tsauri Review Committee on the President is consigned to the dustbin during the senate’s debate on the report.
Obasanjo’s loyalists who want this cause of action are evidently not prepared to wait till May 2, when the Senate reconvenes to have it done.