Rights group, Network for Truth and Justice, NTJ, based in Kogi State has raised the alarm about attempts to frustrate the regime of local government financial autonomy in Kogi State, allegedly by the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
Ahead of the local government elections slated for October by the Kogi State Independent Electoral Commission (KOSIEC), the group in a statement in Lokoja raised concerns about what it termed Kogi APC’s “undemocratic and unconstitutional sales of single nomination forms to selective aspirants” in outright denial of other aspirants and the people of their franchise.
According to the statement signed by NTJ spokesperson, Ajara Maimunat Ahmed, the APC leadership in the state has no plans to hold primary elections and will not be creating rooms for popular participation in the choice of its chairmanship and councillorship candidates as all elective positions aavailable allegedly have already been allocated.
The group recalled the APC stakeholders meeting held at Lokoja penultimate Tuesday, where the party’s state chairman, Abdullahi Bello declared that the legacies of Yahaya Bello, the state’s former chief executive who EFCC has declared wanted for stealing over N80bn public funds would be continued by Ododo, describing the utterances of the party chairman as insensitive and deliberately insulting to the citizens of the state.
Ahmed stated that, “Beyond treading the path of unconstitutionality in its process of selection of candidates for the upcoming local government elections in Kogi State, the ruling APC has continued on the undemocratic agenda set by Yahaya Bello. The APC state chairman, in what can be described as one of the worst undemocratic practices ever seen in the 21st century, had announced that the 239 councillorship positions of the 21 LGAs shall be shared in the ratio of 60/40 percent between men and women! This, according to the standard set by Yahaya Bello, would serve as an improvement and to consolidate on the 35 percent allotted to women in the last local council elections. This, he said, will be in addition to positions as Vice Chairpersons and Council Leaders. And we dare to say that these undemocratic steps constitute a brazen affront to the constitution.”
The group accused the APC of plotting to circumvent the Supreme Court’s ruling on Local Government Autonomy, to maintain control over local government accounts.
The statement partly read, “The constitution is very clear about the requirements of candidacy for elections. Either presidential, governorship, legislative, even local government election, the constitution stipulates a minimum of school certificate as a requirement; that’s what the law says. It is fundamentally wrong, and you cannot go out of your way as governor or as party to create a law that elective positions must be so-so number of men or women. Every man or woman has his or her right to vote and be voted for, so far they meet the requirements. For you now to be making it a law limiting participation in an election to gender considerations and percentages is alien to the constitution. You are denying both men and women their rights that the constitution has given to them.
“Based on the foregoing, the Network for Truth and Justice hereby declare as follows: that the policy of the APC in Kogi State to return all former caretaker chairmen as automatic candidates without allowing for the conduct of primaries, is suppressive and undemocratic; that the directive that councillorship positions of the 239 electoral wards be shared in the ratio of 60/40 percent between men and women, while also ordering for the positions of elective vice-chairmen and council leaders to be occupied by women, is an act of imposition and is alien to the constitution; that, nobody, no matter how highly placed, has power to determine the destiny of any electoral wards or councils or any candidates who may wish to aspire to any positions of choice; that based on the undemocratic actions of the APC in Kogi State, you have taken over the power of the people from the people, which is still part of what the Supreme Court ruled against. Who are you to impose some and deny others? Based on the Supreme Court ruling, the councils are not under the the state apparatuses. The governor recently was quoted as saying Kogi State had been running autonomy government at the local council levels since 2016, which he vowed will continue under his leadership. Is this statement not contradictory when you handpicked 21 caretaker chairmanship candidates while ordering the sale of single nomination forms per local government and electoral wards? In conclusion, it is the position of NTJ that any law that is alien to ourconstitution, including those made by the leadership of APC in Kogi State ahead of the October 2024 local government elections, is null and void. If the people decide to pick all men, so be it. If the electorate decide to pick all women as their elective representatives, so be it”.
The group maintained that Kogi APC’s actions exposed the grand plot by the ruling party to massively rig the upcoming elections to the 21 local councils. This, it noted, is part of the larger plot by the Usman Ododo led APC government in the state to continue to make the third tier of government its milk cow, as was the case during the eight-year tenure of his predecessor, Yahaya Bello.