The mortal remains of late Professor Humprey Nwobu Nwosu, the man who conducted the freest and fairest democratic election in Nigeria on June 12, 1993, was lowered to mother earth on Friday March 28, 2025, at his country-home in Ajalli, Orumba North LGA of Anambra State. For some weeks, a flurry of activities had been organized in the United States, Abuja, Nigeria, and University of Nigeria, Enugu Campus, to celebrate the hero of democracy who provided intellectual, ethical, and courageous leadership when it mattered most. His tenure lasted between February 1989 and June 1993.
Surprisingly, the Nigerian Senate, last week, turned down twice the motion to honour him posthumously by the federal government. The reasons advanced by some of the Senators were that he did not complete the announcement of June 12 presidential election results. That he chickened out and or played the script of a section of the military that did not want to hand over power to civilians. Another Senator claimed that Nwosu’s name reminded him of the death of his brother occasioned by the political stalemate. What a pedestrian line of thought!
It was obvious from the body language of the Deputy Senate President, Senator Barau Jibril, who presided the plenary sessions, that the motion would not fly. The Senators who opposed the motion either exhibited little knowledge of Nwosu’s legacy as an exceptional electoral umpire or that they chose to remain fixated on their biases. Senator Adams Oshiomhole’s comment was the most uncharitable and unbecoming. Was it the Nigerian factor that played out? I wonder how Nwosu’s children and others who staked their lives for this country would feel about the uninformed commentaries devoid of empathy by those who are supposed to show the way. Apparently, most of our leaders scarcely read or research before speaking for the country.
As I wrote in the lead paper presented at the colloquium in his honour at UNN, “Nwosu, as a radical scholar and humanist, faced an ideological battle between defending the people’s will and contending against state capture.” “The military was not ready to relinquish power in 1993…He played on the intelligence of Nigerians with the ‘hidden agenda’ and claimed that he did not want to offend his self-confessed benefactor, Abacha…” This was well documented in Nwosu’s book and somehow, in IBB’s autobiography.
After reading IBB’s autobiography, it became clearer that the uncomplimentary narratives weaved around Nwosu had been propagated to deny him a heroic place in history. Hence, “…there is no iota of commendation for Nwosu by IBB in all the 37 pages that make up Chapter 12 of his autobiography where he discusses the ‘Transition to Civil Rule and June 12 Saga.’ Impliedly, Nwosu spoilt game for them.” Anyway, Nwosu’s golden footprints in NEC did not begin with the conduct of the June 12 presidential election.
Successive Chairmen of the electoral management body (EMB), now called INEC, saw Nwosu’s playbook as a model for giving the body a true semblance of independence. He began its institutionalization by ensuring that it became a scheduled organization in line with Public Service Act. From then, it was entered into the official gazette as an autonomous entity without direct control of the executive arm of government. The amendment of Decree 37 of 1989 granted it the powers to employ, discipline and promote its staff. The expiration and termination of tenures of Chairmen or appointed Commissioners do not lead to the dissolution of the body. By this, it was possible to build institutional memory over the years.
It was under Nwosu that the national headquarters of INEC in Maitama, Abuja, was built. He also built some state offices and established legal departments across the states of the federation to handle cases within their jurisdictions instead of concentrating everything at the centre. Nwosu successfully conducted the local government, gubernatorial and state assembly, as well as national assembly elections with the open ballot and modified open ballot systems. Winners were sworn in, and they had started functioning before the June 12 presidential election, where he applied OptionA4 method for the emergence of flagbearers of the two political parties, NRC, and SDP. Option A4 entailed the conduct of presidential primaries in four stages: ward, local government, state, and national levels before the declaration of the winner.
In the build-up to the June 12 election, Nwosu worked ahead of any legal ambush by some dark forces. NEC under him persuaded the Armed Forces Ruling Council to pass the Decree 8 of 1989 that overruled any Law Court from stopping the presidential election or NEC schedules. Thus, when Justice Bassey Ikpeme of Federal High Court Abuja granted an injunction filed by the Association for Better Nigeria (ABN) led by Arthur Nzeribe on June 10, 1993, to stop the election, Nwosu went ahead with the election as the order was a clear violation of Section 2(1) of Decree 13. Moreover, “From IBB’s account, ABN was not a registered organization, yet the Abuja High Court granted its plea of injunction. The legal landmine was an alibi for the June 12 annulment.”
By June 14, Nwosu had announced the results of 14 States and FCT with other States already collated except Taraba State. Unfortunately, on June 15, an Abuja High Court ordered the suspension of further announcement. NEC complied based on the legal opinion of Mr. Clement Akpamgbo, the then Attorney General of the federation. And on June 21, Justice M.D Saleh, the Chief Judge of Abuja High Court declared the June 12 election illegal. Not deterred, Nwosu-led NEC on June 23, sought the relief of Court of Appeal Kaduna to release the remaining results. It was the same day that the election was annulled and IBB later dissolved NEC. Therefore, blaming Nwosu for the political impasse is unfair.
It is heartwarming to note that President Tinubu, who was represented by David Umahi, the Minister of Works, at Nwosu’s funeral event, had assured of immortalizing the statesman. Indeed, the rightness of a posthumous honour for Nwosu is not just ethical but also a historical necessity.