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Gov. Ayo Fayose of Ekiti State

INEC: Decisions taken by Zakari remain invalid – Fayose; insists Nigeria headed for ‘legal quagmire’

Governor Ayo Fayose
Governor Ayo Fayose

Ekiti State Governor, Mr Ayodele Fayose has claimed that decisions taken by the former acting National Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Hajia Amina Zakari, remained invalid due to the unconstitutional nature of her appointment.

Reacting to the Wednesday’s appointment of Professor Mahmud Yakubu by President Muhammadu Buhari, as substantive National Chairman of INEC, Monday, Governor Fayose posited that the situation may have already plunged the country into what he called a ‘legal quagmire’ as it relates to decisions taken on the forthcoming governorship elections in Kogi and Bayelsa states, later in the year, by Zakari.

It would be recalled that President Buhari had officially appointed former Executive Secretary of the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund), Professor Yakubu as the new National Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

Professor Mahmud Yakubu
Professor Mahmud Yakubu, new INEC national chairman

Yakubu replaces Hajia Amina Zakari, who has acted in that capacity since June 30, this year. Her appointment had raised uproar in political circles.

Yakubu’s appointment was approved by the National Council of State which met Wednesday in Abuja.

However, commenting on the implications of the appointment, Fayose stressed that the situation portends danger for the polity as the former acting National Chairman, Zakari held a position which the constitution did not recognize.

“It should be recalled that l raised the alarm on the legality of INEC under an Acting Chairman or Chairperson as there was no provision for INEC Acting Chairmanship position in the Constitution of Nigeria.

“I did say in a statement issued on August 9, 2105 that any action taken by INEC with Mrs Zakari as its head would amount to illegality and I urged President Muhammadu Buhari to avoid plunging Nigeria into an avoidable legal quagmire by rescinding immediately, the illegal appointment of Mrs Zakari as INEC Acting Chairperson.

“However, the president chose to wait until decisions were taken by INEC on Kogi and Bayelsa States governorship elections and one begins to wonder how INEC will wriggle itself out of the legal quagmire it has been plunged into by the President’s refusal to heed to the voice of reason.”

The governor, who has remained one of the most vociferous critics of the Buhari administration, also said in a statement, signed by his Special Assistant on Public Communications and New Media, Lere Olayinka, in Ado-Ekiti, the state capital, that he had expected the new INEC Chairman to be chosen from one of the three Southern geo-political zones, especially the South Western part of the country being the only zone yet to produce chairman of the nation’s electoral umpire.

“Shouldn’t he have considered someone from either South-East, South-South or South-West as Chairman of the Electoral Commission now that we have a President from the North?” Mr. Fayose asked.

“For reasons of perception, equity and fairness, don’t we have credible people from the Southern part of Nigeria that can conduct credible elections as INEC Chairman?

“Or do we assume that the 2019 elections have already been won and lost by the appointment of this Hausa/Fulani professor as INEC chairman? Or isn’t it regrettable that even in 2015, it is only in PDP controlled States that elections are being upturned?”

Mr. Fayose also expressed worries that the three arms of government, namely, the Executive, Legislature and the Judiciary were being headed by northerners, leaving the three zones in the Southern part of the country with nothing.

“When Chief Olusegun Obasanjo was the President, he never appointed a Yoruba man as INEC chairman. Dr Goodluck Jonathan too did not appoint an Ijaw man as INEC Chairman,” he said.

“Former President Shehu Shagari too did not appoint a Hausa man like himself as Chairman of the Federal Electoral Commission (FEDECO). Rather, he appointed late Justice Victor Ovie-Whiskey.”

Mr. Fayose also recalled that during the Ibrahim Babangida and Sani Abacha regimes, no Hausa/Fulani man was appointed Chairman of the National Electoral Commission of Nigeria, just as General Abdulsalami Abubakar also did not appoint his fellow Hausa man as chairman.

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