{"id":7534,"date":"2013-08-01T20:40:24","date_gmt":"2013-08-01T20:40:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/disnaija.com\/nigerian-newspapers\/why-we-cant-prosecute-electoral-offenders-by-inec-2\/"},"modified":"2013-08-01T20:40:24","modified_gmt":"2013-08-01T20:40:24","slug":"why-we-cant-prosecute-electoral-offenders-by-inec-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/disnaija.com\/why-we-cant-prosecute-electoral-offenders-by-inec-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Why we can\u2019t prosecute electoral offenders, by INEC"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

THE Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Wednesday explained why it has not been able to completely prosecute electoral offenders of the April 2011 general elections.<\/p>\n

  The commission stated that the number of those that were involved in different electoral offences was too high that it overwhelmed the capacity of its legal department to combine their prosecution   with other cases that involved the commission.<\/p>\n

  While receiving the leadership of the Youth Alliance on Constitution and Electoral Reform Wednesday in Abuja, the Chairman of INEC, Attahiru Jega, called on the government to look for a quick alternative by removing the responsibility of prosecuting electoral offenders from the commission, stressing that that would help a quick trial of offenders.<\/p>\n

  Jega, who disclosed that the commission had earlier prosecuted over 200 cases of electoral offenders  noted that it recorded almost one million cases of double registration alone, adding that the legal department was faced with many other cases like election petitions before tribunals.<\/p>\n

  He, however, assured that the commission would continue to do its best in the prosecution of electoral offenders till the time that that responsibility would be taken away from it.   <\/p>\n

   He stressed that the commission had charged its Anambra State office to be ready to prosecute any voter that would be involved in double registration, beginning with the review of voter exercise that would begin on August 15 in readiness for the state governorship election in November.<\/p>\n

 \u201cRegrettably, for those electoral offenders, yes INEC has the responsibility of prosecuting those involved in such acts. Again, I am not giving excuses for our inability to carry out that task in full. What happened was post-election violence, which did not happen at the period of the election, so really, it is within the purview of security agencies in the area of the normal arrest and prosecution. And we have done our best, we do have what we call the inter-agency relationship with the security agencies, we meet periodically with the security agencies either before or after elections to plan, as well as to assess what happens after elections. Severally we have discussed this issue of prosecution of electoral offenders, especially those who have been apprehended and detained for their Kaduna, Niger etc.\u201d<\/p>\n

  \u201cI know that we have taken this issue to a serious length and put pressure on the agencies to prosecute those involved. From what I have been told, some have been prosecuted, but we also know the nature of judiciary procedures which frustrates and delay these cases.<\/p>\n

 \u201cWith regard to the actual electoral offences that were committed in the process of elections, we have had cause to prosecute some offenders. This commission has successfully prosecuted over 200 electoral offenders. Before we came in as a commission in 2010, there was no record of prosecution of electoral offenders in this country. So we have done our best, but of course, what we have done is a drop in the ocean. Regrettably we do not have the capacity to successfully prosecute all the umber of electoral offences we have.\u201d<\/p>\n

  He added: \u201cOn voters\u2019 registration alone, which we did in February 2011, we have close to one million clear cases of offenders especially in the area of double registration. But we are overwhelmed because we have very small legal unit in the commission. Most times that legal unit is overwhelmed by either prosecuting electoral offenders or involved in cases against it from politicians as well as electoral tribunals.\u2019\u2019 <\/p>\n

And that is why, while we have done our best to prosecute that smaller number, we still feel that there is a strong need for the establishment of the electoral offences commission to handle the prosecution of electoral offenders in the country. We have done our best but clearly it is not good enough because we are very busy doing other things. We want that responsibility to be given to somebody else so that it can be done with appreciable result. We have done it, but because it is a drop in the ocean, it appears  that we have not done anything. We will continue to do our best\u201d, Jega assured.<\/p>\n

  Earlier, the national coordinator of the youths Samson Itodo called on the commission to ensure that political parties are forced to allow youths to occupy the position of national youth leaders.<\/p>\n

————————————————————————————————————————-
Posted in Nigerian Newspapers. <\/a>A DisNaija.Com<\/a> network.<\/p>\n

Source: Guardian Newspaper<\/p>\n

DisNaija.Com<\/b> publishes regular posts on Nigeria News,<\/a> Nigerian Newspapers,<\/a> Online Nigeria Gist.<\/a><\/p>\n

Follow us on Twitter<\/a> and Facebook<\/a>.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

Nigerian Newspapers<\/a>
\n
\nFollow @Dis_Naija<\/a>
\n