Without prejudice to whatever willful inadequacies of every mortal, Attahiru Jega, a professor and out-going National Chairman of Nigeria’s election management body, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, deserves to be commended. As he exits that office, there is going to be a fierce battle to fill the slot. And were President Muhammadu Buhari be committed to sustaining the transformative underpinning of Jega’s tenure, he would not need to look beyond the suggestions contained in this piece. More importantly, Mr. President would need to divorce himself of any shade of nepotic and prebendal inclinations in appointing a replacement for Jega so that he, too, would keep faith with the need to build on what Jega started. By Jide Ajani There are moves being made in some quarters by some prominent Emirs to compel President Muhammadu Buhari to appoint another northerner to fill the position of the National Chairman, Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC. Sunday Vanguard learnt that as the battle rages, Mr. President has come under considerable pressure by some traditional rulers from the North directly and, in some instances, using proxies to make a case for one of the National Commissioners. Interestingly, the Commissioner is also from the North West geo-political zone like out-going Attahiru Jega. And in what appears to be a direct unintended though predictable consequence of appointing retired civil servants and old men and women into the Commission, a 75-year old national commissioner (name withheld) was rushed to the Intensive care Unit, ITU, of an You, Akwa Ibom hospital recently while the Commission was having a retreat in that state. Sunday Vanguard was made to understand that even while in a state of coma, he was flown in an air ambulance to an Abuja-hospital. He is still in a coma. The impending exit of the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, Professor Jega, and his peers of national and state Electoral Commissioners brings to a potential an expected finale a remarkable period in the history of the Commission. They are the first crop of electoral Commissioners to midwife the affairs of the Commission after the significant reforms enacted from the recommendations of the Mohammed Lawal Uwais Committee on Electoral Reforms. Professor Jega and the Commission he led conducted two elections, considered largely credible and acceptable globally. Both elections were principally between two main candidates, former President Goodluck Jonathan and incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari, both men won one out of both contests, making any claims of bias to either difficult to sustain. The Commission, under Jega, can therefore be said to have creditably acquitted itself in terms of the independence which the reforms were meant to attain and sustain, but maintaining the relative credibility that the current peer of Commissioners have engendered under the leadership of Jega will require a new INEC Chairman with remarkable and exceptional qualities. Such qualities must be the focus of the incumbent president as he adds this task to the list of appointments on his to-do list. The very important role played by the Commission in consolidating democracy in Nigeria, therefore, impels a closer examination of the qualities of Professor Jega’s potential successor.
Culled from Vanguard news.
Without
prejudice to whatever willful inadequacies of every mortal, Attahiru
Jega, a professor and out-going National Chairman of Nigeria’s election
management body, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC,
deserves to be commended. As he exits that office, there is going to be a
fierce battle to fill the slot.
And were President Muhammadu Buhari be committed to sustaining
the transformative underpinning of Jega’s tenure, he would not need to
look beyond the suggestions contained in this piece.
More importantly, Mr. President would need to divorce himself of any shade of nepotic and prebendal inclinations in appointing a replacement for Jega so that he, too, would keep faith with the need to build on what Jega started.
By Jide Ajani
There are moves being made in some quarters by some prominent Emirs to compel President Muhammadu Buhari to appoint another northerner to fill the position of the National Chairman, Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.
Sunday Vanguard learnt that as the battle rages, Mr. President has come under considerable pressure by some traditional rulers from the North directly and, in some instances, using proxies to make a case for one of the National Commissioners.
Interestingly, the Commissioner is also from the North West geo-political zone like out-going Attahiru Jega.
And in what appears to be a direct unintended though predictable consequence of appointing retired civil servants and old men and women into the Commission, a 75-year old national commissioner (name withheld) was rushed to the Intensive care Unit, ITU, of an You, Akwa Ibom hospital recently while the Commission was having a retreat in that state.
Sunday Vanguard was made to understand that even while in a state of coma, he was flown in an air ambulance to an Abuja-hospital.
He is still in a coma.
The impending exit of the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, Professor Jega, and his peers of national and state Electoral Commissioners brings to a potential an expected finale a remarkable period in the history of the Commission. They are the first crop of electoral Commissioners to midwife the affairs of the Commission after the significant reforms enacted from the recommendations of the Mohammed Lawal Uwais Committee on Electoral Reforms.
Professor Jega and the Commission he led conducted two elections, considered largely credible and acceptable globally.
Both elections were principally between two main candidates, former President Goodluck Jonathan and incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari, both men won one out of both contests, making any claims of bias to either difficult to sustain.
The Commission, under Jega, can therefore be said to have creditably acquitted itself in terms of the independence which the reforms were meant to attain and sustain, but maintaining the relative credibility that the current peer of Commissioners have engendered under the leadership of Jega will require a new INEC Chairman with remarkable and exceptional qualities.
Such qualities must be the focus of the incumbent president as he adds this task to the list of appointments on his to-do list. The very important role played by the Commission in consolidating democracy in Nigeria, therefore, impels a closer examination of the qualities of Professor Jega’s potential successor.
- See more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2015/06/attahiru-jegas-replacement-the-pressure-on-buhari/#sthash.WSQPQE8R.dpuf
Jega…INEC boss
More importantly, Mr. President would need to divorce himself of any shade of nepotic and prebendal inclinations in appointing a replacement for Jega so that he, too, would keep faith with the need to build on what Jega started.
By Jide Ajani
There are moves being made in some quarters by some prominent Emirs to compel President Muhammadu Buhari to appoint another northerner to fill the position of the National Chairman, Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.
Sunday Vanguard learnt that as the battle rages, Mr. President has come under considerable pressure by some traditional rulers from the North directly and, in some instances, using proxies to make a case for one of the National Commissioners.
Interestingly, the Commissioner is also from the North West geo-political zone like out-going Attahiru Jega.
And in what appears to be a direct unintended though predictable consequence of appointing retired civil servants and old men and women into the Commission, a 75-year old national commissioner (name withheld) was rushed to the Intensive care Unit, ITU, of an You, Akwa Ibom hospital recently while the Commission was having a retreat in that state.
Sunday Vanguard was made to understand that even while in a state of coma, he was flown in an air ambulance to an Abuja-hospital.
He is still in a coma.
The impending exit of the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, Professor Jega, and his peers of national and state Electoral Commissioners brings to a potential an expected finale a remarkable period in the history of the Commission. They are the first crop of electoral Commissioners to midwife the affairs of the Commission after the significant reforms enacted from the recommendations of the Mohammed Lawal Uwais Committee on Electoral Reforms.
Professor Jega and the Commission he led conducted two elections, considered largely credible and acceptable globally.
Both elections were principally between two main candidates, former President Goodluck Jonathan and incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari, both men won one out of both contests, making any claims of bias to either difficult to sustain.
The Commission, under Jega, can therefore be said to have creditably acquitted itself in terms of the independence which the reforms were meant to attain and sustain, but maintaining the relative credibility that the current peer of Commissioners have engendered under the leadership of Jega will require a new INEC Chairman with remarkable and exceptional qualities.
Such qualities must be the focus of the incumbent president as he adds this task to the list of appointments on his to-do list. The very important role played by the Commission in consolidating democracy in Nigeria, therefore, impels a closer examination of the qualities of Professor Jega’s potential successor.
- See more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2015/06/attahiru-jegas-replacement-the-pressure-on-buhari/#sthash.WSQPQE8R.dpuf
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