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MARCH 19, 2007 VOL. 20. NO 23

Sustaining a Winning Streak

**President Olusegun Obasanjo**

Vice President Atiku Abubakar scales yet another political hurdle as the Federal High Court rules that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) cannot stop him from running for election
By George Umunnakwe
Efforts to frustrate Vice President Atiku Abubakar out of next month's presidential race last week again hit a brickwall. A Federal High Court sitting in Abuja, had on Wednesday, March 7, 2007 declared that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), lacks the power to disqualify any candidate forwarded to it by a political party.
This is coming barely two days after the Action Congress (AC) issued a threat that there will be no polls in 2007 if its presidential candidate is by any means whatsoever disqualified from the race to Aso rock.
Interestingly, the embattled Vice President had in an Appeal Court judgement of Tuesday, February 20, floored the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) which sought to declare his seat vacant following his defection to the AC. The court presided over by Justice Umaru Abdullahi declared that there was nothing wrong with the defection of Abubakar from the PDP to the Action Congress, to realise his presidential ambition.
This evidently brings to eight, court victories which the Vice President has secured against his adversaries as he prepares to face the electorate in the April 2007 polls.
Delivering judgement, Wednesday, March 7, 2007, Justice Babs Kuewumi stated that the power to disqualify any candidate from contesting the election belongs only to the court. He added that anybody or agency that has a case should go to the court.
Citing section 137 of the 1999 constitution which listed the conditions for the disqualification of any candidate, Kuewumi pointed out that it was only the court that could give effect to the law.
He explained that INEC has a vital role which is assigned to it by the constitution to conduct the elections, apart from monitoring political parties and their finances.
By that role, the Professor Maurice Iwu-led commission, the presiding judge averred has a responsibility to ensure that things were done properly. But this the judge said, does not include "disqualifying or attempting to disqualify persons whose names were submitted to it by the political parties.”
INEC had in the wake of its screening exercise carried out verifications of the documents of candidates submitted to it, and declared that Vice President Atiku Abubakar and some other politicians would not contest the April 2007 polls. While citing the submission of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the report of the seven-man Administrative Panel set up by President Olusegun Obasanjo which indicted the former for abuse of office, the affected candidates, according to INEC, would not achieve their ambitions following the appearance of their names on the EFCC’s list of corrupt politicians in the country.
While this sounded like a sweet song to the ears of its accusers, the camp of the embattled Vice President found it a bitter pill to swallow. And so relying on section 32, sub-section four of the Electoral Act, 2006, which states that “Any person who has reasonable grounds to believe that any information given by a candidate in the affidavit is false may file a suit at the High Court of a state or Federal High Court against such person, seeking a declaration that the information contained in the affidavit is false”, the VP and his party went to court to challenge INEC’s decision.
They did not stop there, as the Vice President’s camp reasoned that section 32, sub section six of the electoral Act, 2006 stated clearly what INEC should do in case of submission of wrong documentation. It states that: “A political party which presents to the commission the name of candidate who does not meet the qualifications stipulated in this section, shall be guilty of an offence and on conviction shall be liable to a maximum fine of N500,000.”
But stating the reason for the disqualification, the INEC posited that sections 66, 106, 107, 117 and 137 of the 1999 constitution states clearly what should be done.
Instructively, while affirming INEC’s right to verify or screen candidates as stipulated in “item 15(a) – (1) of the third schedule of the 1999 constitution and section 32 of the Electoral Act 2006” which gives the INEC the right to conduct and supervise general elections, Kuewumi pointed out that section 32(5) of the Electoral Act 2006 is clear on who can disqualify a candidate. It states that “if the court determines that any of the information contained in the affidavit is false, the court issues order to the candidate stopping him from contesting the election.”
Notedly, with this ruling, it became clear that INEC has again lost the battle to stop the embattled Abubakar from contesting the April polls. The judge said emphatically that if INEC were vested with such a power, it would disrupt the democratic process and cause unnecessary confusion in the polity.
Reacting to the verdict, R Yusuf, counsel to the electoral body, pleaded with the judge not to award the N25,000 costs against INEC which was sought for by Chief Adeniyi Akintola (SAN), counsel to the embattled Vice President. “The plaintiffs had substantially got the reliefs they wanted. It would be too much to award costs against INEC,” he pleaded.
Another counsel to Abubakar, Ricky Tarfa, in an interview on the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) monitored by The Source on Wednesday, March 7, 2007, said he instituted the case because INEC wanted to disqualify people when it had no such powers. According to him, the court granted our prayer. We wanted to confirm that INEC has no power to stop anyone from contesting, that an individual or organisation can only submit his objections to a candidate to the courts for ruling. But on its own, INEC cannot remove a candidate validly nominated by a political party from the ballot.
Meanwhile, the Vice President in describing the judgment, observed that it is a victory for democracy.
Atiku: “Our democracy is well and working. The battle is not yet over, until Nigeria’s democracy is safe. It is important for us to continue to maintain vigilance because I believe that the anti-democratic forces that have laid ambush on this critical transition may not have given up.
“We expect that they would design a new strategy to stop the democratic forces from our march to total freedom.”
Even as efforts are being made not only to frustrate the Vice President but also to stop him, similary in far away, Makurdi, Benue State, chieftains of his party, have started singing one chorus, which all AC supporters are familiar with; that if Atiku is not on the ballot, then there would be no elections.
The embattled Vice President had led his team to the state on March 6 to flag-off his presidential campaign and to officially handover the gubernatorial flag to the AC candidate in the state, Shima Ayati.
Addressing the rally, the presidential candidate of the party told the teeming supporters that they were dissatisfied with the Obasanjo-led administration and had to pull out of the PDP because, “we want a change in this country; a change for better”. He said that the PDP-led government was insistent on disqualifying people because of their desire to rig. “They are now trying to disqualify AC candidates all over. They are saying Ngige has not filled forms. Ah ah, we have an acknowledgement letter from INEC. Today we went to court in Abuja. When you are dealing with a liar, confront him with evidence. Ngige filled the forms but today they are saying Ngige did not because they want to retain the present houseboy in Anambra. If they are popular, why are they afraid of elections,?”
Atiku told the crowd that the Obasanjo-led government promised the country among other things, to develop agriculture, to hook Benue and other states to the national grid, provide water and construct motorable roads, but eight years after, the situation has rather worsened. “I was where such decisions were taken but was only listening, he said. The presidential candidate who described President Obasanjo as "autocratic and greedy" wondered why a president, in addition to his presidential assignment would also have four ministries to man. “Till today President Obasanjo is an oil minister," Abubakar said, contending that President Obasanjo's promise to have the state hooked to the national grid has turned out to be a false promise. Abubakar: “I don’t believe in the miracle that the present administration would provide the required power in these two months”. The AC candidate assured, however, that his administration from May 29 would diversify the source of power. The Federal Government, according to him, would build a hydro power station in Makurdi and would use coal and solar in various places in the country.
In a thunderous speech, a 2003 presidential aspirant and former governor of old Kano State, Alhaji Abubakar Rimi assured the people that whatever would happen, the Vice President would remain in the presidential contest. Rimi did not hesitate to describe President Obasanjo as evil. He has declared that “those leading Nigeria now are dirty and must be removed”.
Rimi lamented that, “we formed PDP and drew up programmes but what we have now is different”. He assured, however, that the AC would be a government of action, which will not steal as PDP stalwarts are currently stealing. The former presidential aspirant also declared that “only voters can stop Atiku from winning the presidential election, not Obasanjo”.
Rimi lamented that even though Nigeria ranks fifth in the production of oil in the world, it is most hit with scarcity. He explained that other oil producing countries have good roads, electricity, portable water but in Nigeria “we have thieves”.
The immediate past national chairman of the PDP and former communications minister Chief Audu Ogbeh, assured the people of the ability of the Vice President to effectively lead the country. Atiku, Ogbeh said, had being in the presidency all these years and had passed 11 examinations in constitutional management. What the country needs, according to him, is a leader not a ruler like Obasanjo.
The Director-General of the Atiku Campaign Organisation and former senate president, Dr. Iyorchia Ayu, also sang the same chorus when he said, if Atiku were not contesting, then there would be no elections in the country. Ayu expressed joy that the party, AC was spreading like wildfire because people were becoming more aware of the fact that President Obasanjo makes promises he does not fulfil. “He made a lot of promises, he never fulfilled any of the promises,” Ogbeh said. As for Benue State, Ayu said Obasanjo comes only when he is in need, pointing out that he came in 1999, four years later he came in 2003, four years later he came in 2007. “Why has he not come in-between so that you will tell him your problems? He comes at such instances claiming to be a friend”.
Ayu revealed that all the money made by previous administrations put together is not up to the money the current administration has made and thus wondered why there was nothing to show for it. This, according to Ayu, is one of the reasons why AC would form the government on May 29 to ensure prudent management of resources.
He told the crowd that President Obasanjo had not only declared him a terrorist, but had also taken him to court and expressed his desire to appear in court. “I am not afraid of going to court, I am not afraid of going to jail, I am not afraid of dying for my people. I am a terrorist because I dumped PDP and joined my colleagues in AC”.
AC, as put by Dr. Laha Dzever who also spoke at the rally, is the party which addresses policies, not character assassination. Dzever said that two political parties were in Makurdi a few days ago but none requested for votes from Benue people. The first, he said, ended up heaping insults on personalities, while the other one only lamented that it was rigged out in the 2003 general elections. He called for support for the Vice President, as according to him, Atiku was the answer to the plight of Nigerians.
Given the fact that all the AC chieftains were key members or founding members of the PDP, analysts are of the view that the PDP would find it difficult to dribble them, as they too are already familiar with the terrain.
Meanwhile, it may not yet be uhuru for the embattled vice president, as the Suppreme Court has fixed hearing on the appeal filled by the Federal Government against the verdict of the court of Appeal, for March 29, 2007. The court had upheld Abubakar as the vice president, regardless of his defection to AC.
Similarly, a Federal High Court in Abuja has started hearing the suit brought by the embattled vice president praying the court to nullify the indictment slammed on him by the EFCC and the Chief Bayo Ojo-headed Administrative Panel of inquiry.
Additional report by Sam Tyav, Makurdi