A civil rights organisation, YIAGA Africa, says it will be unfortunate if President Muhammadu Buhari, re-presents Lauretta Onochie as a nominee for the position of National Commissioner with the Independent National Electoral Commission.
YIAGA urged the President to present a competent and non-partisan woman from the South-South geopolitical zone to replace Onochie (from Delta State), after her rejection by the Senate on Tuesday.
The Executive Director of YIAGA Africa, Samson Itodo, stated this on Tuesday when he featured as a guest on Channels Television’s ‘Politics Today’ programme monitored by The PUNCH.
He also described the rejection of Onochie, an aide to the President on Social Media, as a victory for democracy and for Nigerians.
The PUNCH had earlier reported that the Senate on Tuesday okayed five INEC National Commissioners but rejected Onochie and suspended the confirmation of another nominee, Prof. Sani Adam (North Central).
The nominees of the President who were confirmed were, Muhammad Kallah (Katsina); Kunle Ajayi (Ekiti); and Saidu Ahmad (Jigawa), Baba Bila (North East) and Abdullahi Zuru (North-West).
The upper chamber said it rejected Onochie because her nomination did not satisfy Section 14 (1)3 which bordered on the federal character principles.
When asked whether the President could re-nominate Onochie, the YIAGA boss said, “It will be unfortunate, it will be a violation of the constitution if the President re-present her. I will be shocked if the President re-presents her because he will be joking with the 2023 elections.
“The President on several occasions has commented that he is committed to electoral reforms and he wants to leave a legacy of electoral process that delivers elections that inspire the confidence of the people and one way to do that is in his appointment into the electoral commission and that is why we challenged the appointment of Lauretta Onochie; it was in dissonance to his rhetorics on delivering electoral reforms.
“You can’t populate an electoral commission with people who have clear partisan leanings and expect that citizens and stakeholders will have confidence in the electoral commission.
“By all standards, that appointment was an assault on the independence of INEC if it had scaled through. So, he (Buhari) shouldn’t violate the constitution.
“This controversy is needless, there are women from the South-South region of Nigeria who have the competence and who are non-partisan, the President should present them in the interest of his legacy that he wants to leave for Nigerians.”
The President had renominated former acting Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, CP Ibrahim Magu, for the top job of the anti-graft agency after the Senate rejected him but the Senate rejected him the second time.
Magu, who served as acting chairman of the EFCC from 2015 to 2020, was later suspended alongside several others for allegedly mismanaging funds of the commission, an allegation which he vehemently denied.
The former EFCC boss was probed for over three months by a judicial panel of inquiry led by a former President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Ayo Salami.
The panel made several recommendations but the report has not been made public to date.
