Why Bill Seeking Single Day For All Elections Is Good – Rep Ugochinyere

House of Representatives Member for Ideato North/South, Imo Ugochinyere, has said the bill seeking that all elections be held on the same day is for the good of the country.

Naija News reported that the bill seeking to conduct general elections for the offices of the President, State Governors, National Assembly members, State Houses of Assembly members, and Local Government Area Councillors on the same day, passed second reading in the Senate and House of Reps, on Thursday and Tuesday respectively.

Ugochinyere, who sponsored the bill in the House said the bill would help improve turnout of voters and reduce voter apathy.

Speaking in an interview with Arise News, on Thursday, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) lawmaker explained that the bill also seeks to address other challenges confronting the nation’s electoral system.

His words: “Well, all these things are proposals, which has gone past second reading, and then they will go to committee stage, there will be public hearing, during which stakeholders like INEC are going to make input to say why it should be or not another stakeholder.

“But the most important thing is that we are trying to find what will work best for our other country. And the political players, the INEC, the judiciary, are all complicit one way or the other in what has made our electoral process not to be that perfect as we desire.

“There’s also a provision in the bills that some of my colleagues also sponsored that went through second reading, putting a timeline for decisions on election disputes before swearing in the respective winners into office. You have timelines that have to do with the relevant publications and timelines of what INEC is supposed to do.

“And also there’s provision now that is giving powers to the Federal High Court to get involved in electoral offenses so that people who have fallen short of the law are going to be dead.

“There’s also proposal from people that has to do with it about how do we make INEC more neutral in terms of should we go back to the situation we used to have before where INEC staff are the returning officers, INEC staff are the collection of staff. Instead of in trying to cure the lapses of that era, we brought in lecturers that have shown to be, with all due respect to them, worse than the situation we used to have with INEC.

“We have lecturers, we have professors who announce results that does not tally with accreditations, will even announce results even while election is still going on. Should we not go back so that INEC staff who are government staff that can be held accountable should administer this collection process and returning process instead of giving it to lecturers who most of them feel it doesn’t consign them.

“They’ll just come and announce whatever they like and then run away from the polling unit. All these things are aimed at finding what is best for the country. And it’s not like cast on stone. It’s something that is subject to amendment as we go forward.”