Regarding court judgments, he said the commission had started taking action, adding: "We took a decision as a commission. Any judgment that is passed while we are here and if it indicts people either by name or office, we will investigate and follow due process. In the case of Ekiti, we have gone very far, many people have been queried and they have replied and the disciplinary committee is moving."
The INEC chairman said a similar action would be carried out in both Delta and Ogun States. "We have already gotten people starting the judgment and bringing out the names of people. We cannot rush it. The wheel of justice, they say, grinds slowly, but the important thing is not to commit injustice while you are doing that."
Jega gave a pass mark to the political parties' primary elections, but said: "it could be better."
Unquote
Jega: We're on Course
21 Jan 2011
Ahead of the April general election, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has said only political parties with presidential candidates will have their logos printed on the presidential ballot papers.
Also, the commission stated that there was no cause for alarm over the initial complaints in the ongoing voter registration, as the problems had been identified and solved.
It has, however, blamed one of the contractors for the supply of the Direct Data Capture (DDC) machines for failing to deliver on time.
Speaking in an interview with select newsmen in Abuja yesterday, Chairman of INEC, Prof. Attahiru Jega, also said all staff members of the commission indicted by the Osun and Delta Governorship Appeal Tribunals would face disciplinary panel and if found guilty, face prosecution.
According to Jega, "The important thing is to ensure that whoever is fielded legally in accordance with the electoral laws are on the ballot. If a party does not have a candidate for the election, it doesn't make sense to put them on the ballot."
Explaining the conditions for alliance by political parties, he said: "The law is there; I hope they are reading the electoral law. There are timeline about doing things and you should do things within the time frame. There is time frame within which you can submit list of nomination and within which you can withdraw. You can't send names today and say we are taking it and bring another name. But for example, if there is an unfortunate thing about death within a particular timeframe, the law allows for a substitution."
He said everything about the presidential election would be guided by the tenets of the electoral law.
According to the INEC chairman, "What I want to tell you is that I will assure you and all Nigerians that we are going to do everything in accordance with the way the law provides. If people comply with the law, they will have no problem with us."
On the problems encountered in the ongoing voter registration exercise, he said: "What happened was that the factory set the fingerprints very, very high and that was why it was rejecting. It became very sensitive and if there is any slight problem with the fingerprint; whether it is oil or dark, it was just rejecting the fingerprints and obviously, there was a threshold and what we did was to adjust the threshold and once that was done, you can see how things have changed remarkably."
He blamed part of the problems on one of the DDC contractors, Avante Technology, which he said had failed to live up to the terms of the contract.
Jega said the company only supplied 5,500 units of the DDC machines out of the 22,000 units awarded to it, adding that the firm had promised to supply the remaining before Sunday.
Not ruling out the possibility of extension of time for the voter registration, he said it was too early in the day to do so.
Jega said in established cases where there are short supplies of the machines, efforts would be made to ensure that all the registrable voters are registered.
The INEC chairman said the commission had supplied 117,000 units of the DDC machines to the 120,000 polling units in the country.
Jega acknowledged that there are cases of double registration, but said it would only succeed in one in a million.
"Double registration is happening and I assure you it is useless because we have a very, very effective system that protects fingerprints and eliminates double registration. We have three ways of checking double registration. At the polling unit. It is impossible for anybody to come to one machine and register twice but what has been happening is that people are moving from one polling unit to another to register.
"They can do that, unfortunately because of lack of internet capability in our country, all the DDC machines are not internet connected in 120,000 polling units, so, it is difficult to cross-check fingerprints while the exercise is going on. But we have set up a system at the state level where all the data collected from the polling units are coming to the state and we are going to check the fingerprints across and within local governments and at all of those levels. We will eliminate double registration.
"When we finish, we will also bring it to the national headquarters and at that point, if there is any remaining duplication, it will also be removed. The system we are using is of international standard, that there is only one chance of multiple registration in five million and that is to show the integrity of the system that we are using for this purpose. In Kano, I received a report that somebody has registered 10 times in different polling units. But that person is heading for prosecution because by the time we consolidate data in the state, we will have the information. Remember the photograph is there; he may use different names but the photograph is there. Even if we have to get the police to make him a wanted person and we will prosecute him," Jega said.
On the in-house cleansing of the INEC officials that were indicted by the various election tribunals, the INEC chairman said: "If we have evidence of wrongdoing, we are not going to sweep it under the carpet; we are going to use it. We will investigate it, be fair to you and if the evidence is there, we will prosecute you. That is what we have been doing and we have been carrying people along," he said.
He also said: "We have been doing that secretly and we don't need to advise that many people have left because they have been retired or dismissed but we are being fair to everybody and follow due process," he said.
Regarding court judgments, he said the commission had started taking action, adding: "We took a decision as a commission. Any judgment that is passed while we are here and if it indicts people either by name or office, we will investigate and follow due process. In the case of Ekiti, we have gone very far, many people have been queried and they have replied and the disciplinary committee is moving."
The INEC chairman said a similar action would be carried out in both Delta and Ogun States. "We have already gotten people starting the judgment and bringing out the names of people. We cannot rush it. The wheel of justice, they say, grinds slowly, but the important thing is not to commit injustice while you are doing that."
Jega gave a pass mark to the political parties' primary elections, but said: "it could be better."
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