The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has urged Nigeria’s 36 state governors “to promptly disclose details of chairmen and members of the State Independent Electoral Commissions (SIECs) in the states, including their qualifications and political affiliations, if any, and the mechanisms of their appointment.”
SERAP urged the governors “to provide the details of the results of local government elections conducted in their states since 1999, and the voters’ register for any such elections.”
The group also urged the governors “to explain how your states have complied with the requirements of the Nigerian Constitution 1999 [as amended] and international standards on the conduct of periodic local government elections in your states, including the details of any law regulating such elections in your states.”
The Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Professor Mahmood Yakubu had last week alleged that “the conduct of local government elections in virtually all states has become mere coronation of candidates of the ruling parties.”
In a Freedom of Information request dated 1 June, 2024 and signed by SERAP’s deputy director Kolawole Oluwadare, the organisation said: “State governors have the constitutional responsibility to establish and allow independent electoral commissions to conduct local government elections fairly and impartially.”
SERAP said: “The reported interference by state governors in the operations of SIECs and apparent manipulation of local government elections are clearly incompatible with Nigerians’ right to effectively participate in their own government.
“SERAP is concerned that SIECs lack the capacity and independence to effectively and efficiently perform their constitutional and statutory functions.
“Many of the SIECs have no functional offices in the local government areas in their states and cannot recruit their own permanent staff. In some states, the SIECs are either not properly constituted, have no security of tenure or their critical functions have been taken over by government officials.
“Some SIECs are only constituted on the eve of elections and dissolved thereafter. They are also severely under-resourced.”