Nigeria Decides: NLC Speaks On 2019 General Elections

The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has advised the Federal Government to revisit the report by the Justice Mohammed Uwais-led Electoral Reform Committee and implement the recommendations on reinforcing INEC’s independence.

In a statement obtained by Naija News on Thursday, Amechi Asugwuni, NLC Acting President, said that the conduct of the 2019 Nigerian general elections was largely peaceful in many parts of the country, though there were a number of logistic and security issues that dogged the conduct of this year’s general election.

“We also call for a sincere revisit of the Justice Uwais Electoral Reform Report especially as it relates to reinforcing INEC’s independence, unbundling of INEC and setup of Elections Offences Commission,” he said.

“We call on President Muhammadu Buhari to show commitment to implementing aspects of Uwais Report which relevance is validated by recent developments in our electoral space.

“We also demand that INEC must ensure free, fair, and credible elections in some states where the process was declared inconclusive and polls rescheduled for March 23.

“Efforts must also be re-doubled to develop a new national civic culture that venerates the rule of law.

“The trend where politicians consider themselves successful to the extent that they are able to manipulate our electoral laws, maim and kill their fellow citizens, bribe voters and perpetrate all sort of electoral shenanigans must be put to a stop.”

He, however, said INEC should be commended for insisting on the use of card readers for elections in every part of the country and for issuing a policy statement that no election result obtained through duress would be validated by the issuance of a certificate of return.

He said it was clear that these pronouncements hardly served as sufficient deterrence to those bent on foisting the rule of the jungle on Nigeria election process.