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MONDAY QUARTER-BACKING: On the Matter of INEC's Chairman Jega's Maiden Press Conference (of July 22, 2010)
by
Mobolaji E. Aluko, PhD
Burtonsville, MD,USA
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AUGUST 2, 2010
Dear All:
1. The speech write-up below is worth studying very closely by all who are interested in free, fair and credible elections in 2011. Prof. Jega has laid out the options clearly, even though he has "talked" carefully apparently hoping not to cause any alarm.
2. The necessity for a comprehensive, robust and reliable NEW VOTERS' REGISTER is a sine-qua-non for credible 2011 elections. Merely cleaning up the existing voters' register and achieving only a 10% improvement aim (according to Jega) is not a viable option. What is crucially needed is the setting up of a robust and sustainable Electoral Information Resource Management (E-IRM) process, focused not only on crucial Information and Communications Technology (ICT), but also equally on its human management in order for the new voters' register and subsequent electoral processes to be fully credible.
3. The January 2011 date for the General Elections should be dumped once-and-for-all in preference for April 2011 for logistical reasons related to obtaining this new and credible voters' register. We cannot register 60 million people in 60 days. In six months - between mid-August and mid-February 2011 - yes; in two months, no. Jega may be hesitant to say so, but Nigerians should scream so into the ears of the National Assembly and the President who must still sign their amendments into law.
4. We don't need 120,000 machines as stated by Jega below - that is, one machine per polling unit. In fact, for partial redundancy, in that case, we might need as many as 180,000 machines! Rather, we should base the number of machines on three REGISTRATION CENTERS per ward (on average). With about 9,000 wards in the country, that is about 30,000 machines, and with partial redundancy, we can get away with 50,000 machines. That will save us N21 billion in foreign exchange for data capture machines, etc.
5. Dispute resolution before installation of elected officials remains an inviolable concept. Note: disputed legislators can always wait - provided their relevant House or Assemblies form a quorum without them - while disputed President/governors can be filled in for temporarily by a constitutionally-elected Senate President/Assembly Speaker as the case may be. The notion of possibly illegal legislators making laws, or possibly illegal executive using "security votes" to pay for legal services to secure their possibly stolen mandates; embarking on "permanent campaigns" with an eye to re-run elections, and in even extending their tenures by another four years in the event that they win their re-run elections should violate every democratic instinct in humanity.
6. The argument for the January 2011 poll was for adequate time for dispute resolutions before the May 29 hand-over date. The argument for April 2011 should NOT however be predicated on extending that hand-over date to October 1 - that is backdoor and un-constitutional tenure extension, which should not be an option!
7. With a more credible electoral process - including un-biased umpire(s) as we hope in the new INEC - will come much fewer complaints, or complaints that can be prima-facie and/or quickly dismissed in court. It is a myth that the Nigerian is a sore election loser even in the face of fair umpiring. With Gubernatorial Dispute tribunals now separated from Legislative Dispute tribunals, more attention can be quickly given to combat the more negative aspect of interminable gubernatorial disputes. Considering the overall disputes to be civil rather than criminal - and parking the individual criminal acts to an Electoral Offences Tribunal - will lower the existing bar of "proof beyond reasonable doubt." Finally, if dispute resolutions are restricted to physical ballot recounts - rather than judges adding and subtracting votes in mid-air, including working-to-the-answer - they will be more quickly disposed of.
8. The 2011 Elections promise to be another "watershed" in Nigeria's "nascent democracy" as we continue along a "learning process" - again. We all must be tired of these hackneyed phrases already.
And there you have it.
Bolaji Aluko
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MAIDEN PRESS CONFERFENCE BY THE CHAIRMAN, INDEPENDENT NATIONAL ELECTORAL COMMISSION, PROF. ATTAHIRU M. JEGA, OFR,
22 JULY 2010
Preamble
Ladies and Gentlemen of the Press:
As you are aware, this new Commission was sworn-in by the President on 30 June, 2010, barely three weeks ago. Since our inauguration, the 1999 Constitution has been amended and a Bill for a new Electoral Act is close to enactment by the National Assembly. As a Commission, we have spent the last three weeks taking stock and assessing not only the state of affairs at INEC, including our preparedness for the elections, but also the implications of these recent and impending legal changes for our work. I wish to seize this opportunity to share with you and more widely the Nigerian people, the state of affairs and, particularly, its implications for the imminent 2011 general elections.
ASSESSMENT OF PRESENT STATE OF INEC
We have spent the first two weeks since our inauguration evaluating the institutional and human capacities at INEC, focusing particularly on repositioning the organization for the daunting task of delivering free, fair and credible elections in Nigeria. This culminated in the four-day retreat we had in Uyo last week. We have practically gone through the organization with a toothcomb, taking extensive briefings from staff. We have also had series of meetings with both the executive and legislative arms of government as well as our international partners.
We are pleased with the level of goodwill from all stakeholders. I want to thank in particular, the UNDP and its partners for making our retreat in Uyo possible. However, our assessment is that a lot of work is required in institutional restructuring, planning and execution if we are to reposition INEC to deliver on its core mandate of free, fair and credible elections in 2011 and beyond. Still, I can assure you that with the support of Nigerians we are determined to achieve our objectives.
Implications of Constitutional Amendments
As I have already mentioned, the National Assembly recently passed the first set of Amendments to the 1999 Constitution and the enactment of a new Electoral Act is nearing completion. A number of these Constitutional amendments and proposed changes to the electoral law directly deal with INEC and also have a direct bearing on the conduct of elections in Nigeria, particularly the 2011 general elections.
Let me therefore start by addressing the implications of some of the Constitutional amendments for INEC's preparation for the impending General Elections, particularly regarding the Voters' Register, which, I must confess, falls far short of the level of credibility required for free and fair elections. In the course of our retreat in Uyo, we closely looked through the existing Voters' Register sampling over 100 polling units from randomly selected 19 States. What we found were massive inadequacies including underage registrants, hundreds of blank or blurred photographs and multiple registrations by the same persons. The specific implications of the Constitutional amendments for registration of voters and the forthcoming elections include:
a. Based on amendments to Sections 76(2), 116(2), 132(2) and 178(2) of the Constitution, elections must take place between 150 and 120 days to the end of tenure. Consequently, the forthcoming elections must hold between 30th December 2010 and 29th January 2011. If we take the midpoint between these two dates to give room for effective preparations and possible runoff elections, it means that the elections will take place between the 8th and 15th of January 2011.
b. Section 31 (1) of the Electoral Act provides that notice of election must be issued 150 days prior to an election. That being the case, to hold the first election on 8th January 2011, we must issue the notice by 11th August 2010.
c. Section 10 (5) of the Electoral Act provides that registration of voters, updating and revision of the register of voters must end 120 days before an election. That means that registration of voters must end by 9th September 2010, barely two months from now. However, Section 21 of the Electoral Act makes it possible for claims, objections, verification, correction and final certification of the Voters' Register to continue until 60 days to an election, that is 9th November 2010.
Time and Funding
Given the foregoing reality, we are faced with the choice of either compiling a new Voters' Register in less than eight weeks or embarking on the Herculean task of "salvaging" the existing register in 16 weeks. Either of the two presents a very difficult choice in deed. With every sense of responsibility, the Commission has considered all the available options and reached the following conclusions:
a. Every action of the Commission must be based on law. We as a Commission will be steadfast to the Constitution, which we have sworn to uphold, and to existing laws guiding the activities of the Commission, particularly the electoral law.
b. Accordingly, we have sent a communication to the National Assembly requesting modifications to several parts of the electoral law as it considers the Bill for a new Electoral Act presently before it. In that communication we have requested the distinguished and honourable members of the National Assembly to consider the following areas:
(i) Section 10 (5) of the Electoral Act: To reduce the time for the end of the registration, updating and revision of the register of voters from 120 days before an election to 60 days. This gives us an additional eight weeks, bringing the total period available to compile a new register to 16 weeks.
(ii) Section 21 of the Electoral Act: To reduce the time for completion of Supplementary list of voters, integration into the existing register and final certification from 60 days before the election to 30 days. That gives us a total of 20 weeks to attempt a "salvage" of the existing register.
(iii) In addition, we have requested the National Assembly to amend Section 11 (4) of the Electoral Act which is ambiguous and creates the impression that as soon as we announce the notice of elections, registration of voters must terminate.
If the amendments we have proposed scale through in good time, and I must say that initial indications are that the National Assembly is favourably disposed to our request, then we have four months, starting from August, to compile a new Voters' Register for the elections, employing an electronic data capturing system. Although this is a Herculean task considering the size, population and other social and political conditions of our country, we are determined to compile a new, permanent and credible Voters' Register since it is the irreducible minimum for conducting free and fair elections, which is what Nigerians expect from us.
We have no illusion that fresh registration of voters in four months will produce a perfect register. However, we promise to give Nigerians a Register that is vastly more trustworthy and capable of producing free and fair elections than the existing one. It will also form a plausible dataset that future continuous registration, as provided by law, can build on.
Apart from time, there is the central question of resourcing the process adequately. Adequate funding is not only crucial for procurement of equipment, but also for training and logistics. To be able to conduct a credible Voters' Registration in four months, we need to fully deploy registration equipment in all the 120,000 polling units in Nigeria concurrently. Part of the problem of the 2006/07 exercise was that only about 30,000 machines were deployed, involving constant movement of the machines from one point to another. I should note that the recent experience of Bangladesh, a country of apparent similarities with Nigeria, in which the same approach of moving machines around was used, has been widely cited as the gold standard of voter registration for similar countries. In Bangladesh it took about 11 months to complete the process, using 10,000 machines and moving them from Region to Region until they completed the registration. Unfortunately, we do not have 11 months, and given the obvious time constraints, I am not sure that we can risk the possibility of machines not arriving at required destinations at the expected times, data corruption or loss or even complete disappearance of machines into private hands in the process.
Following extensive consultations with experts in electronic voter registration and logistics, as well as manufacturers and vendors of electronic data capture equipment in the past three weeks, our assessment is that it will cost between =N=55 billion and =N=72 billion to conduct a credible compilation of a new Voters' Register between August and November. This is based on the procurement and full deployment of 120,000 composite electronic voter registration equipment, principally laptop computers, finger print scanners, high resolution cameras, backup power packs and integrated printer for producing temporary but high quality voters' cards that can be used for the January elections. Each unit of equipment alone is estimated to cost about $2,000, giving a total Naira equivalent of over =N=36.48 billion for the procurement of equipment alone. Still, this is predicated on getting the equipment directly from the manufacturers instead of middlemen, which will be even more expensive.
Timelines for Compiling New Voters' Register
Provided that the necessary funding is available by the beginning of August, we have to keep to the following almost inflexible timelines, if we have to complete the new Voters' Register by 9th November.
| | Deliverables | Timelines |
| (i) | Identification of equipment suppliers | Early August 2010 |
| (ii) | Award of contract | Early August 2010 |
| (iii) | Delivery of 15,000 units of equipment for training | Early September 2010 |
| (iv) | Delivery of balance of equipment for registration exercise | Mid October 2010 |
| (v) | Training | Early to Mid September 2010 |
| (vi) | Completion of deployment of equipment to polling units | Mid October 2010 |
| (vii) | Registration exercise | Late Oct. – Early Nov. 2010 |
| (viii) | Printing of Voters' Register for display | Early November 2010 |
| (ix) | Display of Voters' Register | Mid November 2010 |
| (x) | Verification, correction and certification | Mid Nov. – Early Dec. 2010 |
Possibility of Cleaning Up the Existing Register
It goes without saying that our absolute preference is to compile a new Voters' Register, the constraint of time notwithstanding, given the massive problems that have trailed the existing Register. If, however, we do not get the requisite amendments to the electoral law and/or the funding is not provided in good time, we will have no option than to work within the law and attempt to "salvage" the existing register by 9th November, as presently provided by the Electoral Act. Should such a lamentable circumstance arise, this Commission can only guarantee raising the credibility of that register perhaps by only about 10%, based on what we have seen of it. This is again based on the availability of at least 30,000 direct capture machines and the following timelines:
| | Deliverables | Timelines |
| (i) | Complete selective bidding for printing existing register | Early August 2010 |
| (ii) | Complete printing of register | Early August 2010 |
| (iii) | Distribution of register to Pus | Mid August 2010 |
| (iv) | Completion of pasting of register | Mid to Late August 2010 |
| (v) | Display and acceptance of claims and objections (14 days) | Late Aug. – Early Sept. 2010 |
| (vi) | Verification of claims and objections (in-house) | Early September 2010 |
| (vii) | Identification of equipment suppliers | Early August 2010 |
| (viii) | Award of contract | Early August 2010 |
| (ix) | Delivery of 30,000 units of equipment for training | Mid September 2010 |
| (x) | Training | Mid September 2010 |
| (xi) | Completion of deployment of equipment | Late September 2010 |
| (xii) | Correction of verified claims and objections moving from Zone to Zone | Late Sept – Late October 2010 |
| (xiii) | Final processing and certification of register | Late Oct – Early Nov 2010 |
Conclusion
In conclusion, you would agree with me that what I have set out is a near-impossible schedule, but we are determined to give it our best. However, we are open to suggestions in the face of the time, resource and legal realities confronting the Commission. Indeed, with the help of different stakeholders, we are in touch with the election management bodies in Ghana, Bangladesh, India and South Africa to learn from their experiences. We appeal to Nigerians for constructive advice, support and understanding.
We are under no illusion that even the compilation of a new register will be foolproof or perfect; speak less of review of the existing register. But we are determined to make a success of producing a new register, if given the wherewithal. We are also determined that beyond the Voters' Register, other problematic areas that have undermined our elections in the past will be vigorously tackled through strong, honest and transparent leadership from the Commission. As I have repeatedly promised Nigerians, we are determined to deliver an electoral process within the very short period we have, which will be a qualitative improvement over previous elections.
Thank you for your continued support and understanding.
Professor Attahiru Jega, OFR
Chairman of the Commission
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