Electoral Act Amendment: Senate Seeks Mandatory Debates For Presidential, Guber Candidates

• Seeks end to voting along ethnic, religious lines

BY VICTOR OSOWOCHI, ABUJA – The Nigerian Senate on Thursday took a bold step at strengthening the nation’s electoral process by advocating electoral debates as mandatory requirements for candidates of political parties seeking to contest Presidential and Governorship elections in Nigeria.

Leading the debate, sponsor of the Electoral Act Amendment bill 2020 (SB.176), Senator Abdulfatai Buhari (APC – Oyo North), said the amendment being sought for in the Electoral Act, if passed by the National Assembly, will help put an end to voting based on ethnic and religious allegiances in the country.

He also said that when signed into law by President Muhammadu Buhari, the amended Act will empower the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to organize and conduct debates for all candidates aspiring to the office of the President and Vice President as well as that of Governor and Deputy of a State.

The lawmaker said introducing debate to Nigeria’s election process would enable the electorate to not only know about the personalities of the candidates, but also their lifestyles, beliefs, and reaction to national issues and foreign policy.

“The Election Debates bill, if passed into law, shall be used to sample the candidates’ knowledge on a wide range of issues, like a detailed analysis on how they intend to drive the economy, foreign, health and education policies among others,” Senator Buhari said.

Likening the process to the function of the National Assembly under Section 147(1) of the Constitution (as amended) on the confirmation of Ministerial appointments, the lawmaker said the introduction of election debate would give electorates the platform to ask questions and test the knowledge of candidates on a wide range of issues.

“Anyone who desires to be Governor or President should be confident enough to lay derailed analysis of his or her plan before the electorates.

“This will offer the electorates the avenue to evaluate candidates and they will vote along ideological lines, rather than on ethnic or religious allegiance as it is prevailing in our country today,” Buhari said.

According to him, “other African countries that have imbibed the culture of elections debates include Ghana and Sierra-Leone among others. If these countries can successfully organize election debates for potential nominees, thereby strengthening their democracy, it can only be an oversight on the part of Nigeria, who prides itself as the Giant of Africa not to provide an all-inclusive avenue for her electorate to assess their to-be representatives through informed processes.”

Speaking on the bill, President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan, however called for the creation of a separate Commission to be saddled with the responsibility of organizing election debates in the country.

He said such arrangement would not only reduce the burden on INEC, but also secure the interest of opposition candidates who are expected to participate in such debates.

“I believe that INEC has enough responsibilities and to give them the responsibility again to organize this kind of debate, INEC being a government body, will cause some difficulty for people, especially in the opposition, in participating in such debates.

“So, I think we probably go the way of other countries, to have non-State actors, and independent people,” Lawan advised.

He thereafter referred the bill which passed its second reading to the Senator Kabiru Gaya-led Committee on INEC for further legislative work