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A civil society group, Citizens’ Advocacy for Social and Economic Rights (CASER), in conjunction with the people of Imo West senatorial district, has threatened to organise a-1,000 man protest in Abuja if the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) failed to issue a certificate of return to Rochas Okorocha as senator-elect for the district within seven days.
The Abuja-based group stated this in a letter dated May 2, 2019 addressed to the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Mahmood Yakubu.
The election’s Returning Officer, Prof. Francis Ibeawuchi, had declared Okorocha winner of the Imo West senatorial election held on Saturday February 23, but later said he acted under duress, a development which made INEC to deny Okorocha a certificate of return.
However, CASER posited that Okorocha, having been declared winner in the election, should have been issued the certificate of return alongside other elected members of the National Assembly.
The letter signed by Andrew Korna on behalf of the Executive Director, stated the “the act of withholding the certificate of a declared winner in an election is not just a clear case of abuse of constitutional powers by INEC, but it has become a painful denigration of a supposedly independent, impartial and unbiased electoral umpire that has now become embroiled and tainted with the corrupt vestiges of partisan politics.”
CASER stressed that INEC, being a creation of the laws of the land should be guided by the laws at all times.
“It is strange and highly despicable that on the basis of mere hearsay, INEC will withhold the certificate of return of Okorocha after being declared winner by a Returning Officer appointed by the same INEC.”
The group also said by withholding Okorocha’s certificate of return, INEC risked jeopardising its hard-earned credibility.
“It is a highly dangerous precedent, the cost of which will be monumental if INEC decides to sacrifice its integrity on the cheap altar of political expediency that is driven by unscrupulous persons who do not care about the need to preserve the legal order.”
CASER added that no part of the 1999 Constitution or the Electoral Act vested in INEC the power to withhold a certificate of return after a winner has been declared in an election, saying the only option open is for aggrieved participants in the election to seek redress in an election tribunal.
