A chieftain of the ruling All Progressives Congress, Gbenga Olawepo-Hashim, on Saturday raised fears that the Independent National Electoral Commission could endanger the conduct of the 2023 general elections with what he alleged to be its “plots and partisan interests.”
According to him, the looming danger stemmed from the “tight INEC schedule of primaries imposed on political parties in the country.”
Olawepo-Hashim said he had expected political parties “to be in court over this matter to lay to rest INEC’s meddlesomeness in their party’s internal affairs.”
He, therefore, advised that the commission postpone the primaries by two months on account of the tight schedule of the parties to protect the integrity of the 2023 elections.
“The nation loses nothing by allowing a two-month additional window for party primaries in line with the 180-day requirement of the law,” he said in a statement issued in Abuja.
According to him, INEC’s schedule “has been influenced purely by a section of the political elites who have positioned themselves to benefit from this INEC calendar.”
He said, “We have come a long way in our journey and as one of those who played a prominent role in that transition process in 1998, I can smell danger from afar any time it rears its ugly head.
“The current tough-guy grandstanding of the INEC Chief must give way to reason so as not to endanger the entire process.
“Predictably, the political process is robbed of any clarity as there is even confusion as to who is lawfully a qualified delegate to primaries that are supposed to be going on.
“Unfortunately, the INEC management has continuously insisted that party primaries schedule cannot be changed.
“To start with, it is not the business of INEC to fix dates of primaries inasmuch as the primaries are conducted 180 days before the election in accordance with the provision of extant law.”
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