The Accord Party in Lagos State has again urged the National Assembly to “scrap the State Independent Electoral Commission (SIEC)” so that the integrity of grassroots elections can be guaranteed.
State Chairman of Accord, Dele Oladeji, voiced the appeal in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Sunday while reviewing Saturday’s Local Government elections.
Oladeji, who stressed that “State Electoral Commissions are not in any way independent. LASIEC is an example. They are not in any way independent,” argued that abolishing them would allow the will of the people to prevail at the grassroots.
He proposed transferring SIEC responsibilities to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) “to enhance democracy and ensure healthy political participation and competition at the grassroots.”
Oladeji said: “Nigerians are ready, Nigerians are prepared for better elections, but when the umpire is biased, there is nothing they can do, and a lack of confidence in the process is the root cause of apathy.”
He dismissed the claim that INEC would be overburdened, calling it “a lie.”
“They won’t be overburdened, it is a lie. INEC has been around for some time, fine-tuning its operations. INEC can effectively and efficiently run local government elections, just as they run state and national elections,” he said.
Commenting on Saturday’s polls, Oladeji said: “The election cannot in any way be said to be free and fair, and the fault is mainly with the electoral commission. It is not free and fair because the formula was wrong; there is no way you can get the answer. When you have candidates properly nominated by a political party, but disenfranchised by the umpire, when you have candidates that were not even sure of whether they were on the ballot, not until election day, we cannot call that election credible. So, all those anomalies were there. It was not credible.”
He concluded: “LASIEC needs to borrow a leaf from INEC for efficiency and transparency.”
NAN reports that 15 political parties took part in the state’s local government election.
