Electoral Act: Buhari under fire

The APC spoke as the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has criticised President Muhammadu Buhari and the ruling party over the delay in assenting the latest amendment to the Electoral Act, which could affect the primaries of all political parties.

Unless President Buhari assents to the Electoral Act 2022 Amendment Bill before him, only 2,340 ad hoc delegates instead of 7,800 would be participating at the presidential convention of the APC, to elect the party’s presidential candidate for next year’s election. A similar scenario obtains in all the parties

This is because the current Electoral Act 2022 (as amended) does not provide a role for statutory delegates during the convention.

The ad hoc delegates would be drawn from Nigeria’s 774 local government areas and six Area Councils of the nation’s capital, Abuja.

Statutory or “Super” delegates include elected councillors, elected local government chairmen and their vice, political party chairmen in all the 774 LGAs and the Federal Capital Territory FCT, state and federal lawmakers, governors and their deputies, president and vice president, political parties’ National Working Committee members, state party chairmen and secretaries.

The provision in the Principal Act reads: “A political party that adopts the system of indirect primaries for the choice of its candidate shall clearly outline in its constitution and rule the procedure for the democratic election of delegates to vote at the convention, congress or meeting.

Last week, federal lawmakers amended Section 84 of the Principal Act by deleting subsection (8) and inserting a new subsection (8) as follows: “A political party that adopts the system of indirect primaries for the choice of its candidates shall clearly outline in its constitution and rules the procedure for the democratic election of delegates to vote at the convention, congress or meeting, in addition to statutory delegates already prescribed in the Constitution of the party.”

The amendment bill was reportedly transmitted to the president on May 13, and he has a 30-day constitutionally guaranteed window within which to assent to the Act or withhold assent.

As it is, the President has up to June 13 to do so. However, any assent after the primaries of the parties would not be useful for the 2023 polls. Also, any assent a day or two to the primaries will affect logistics and harm the exercises.