The Senate on Tuesday flayed the wave of electoral
violence recorded during the recent gubernatorial elections held in Kogi and
Bayelsa States.
It also
called on the Inspector-General of Police (IG), Mohammed Adamu, to
arrest and prosecute the killers of the Women Leader of the Peoples Democratic
Party (PDP) in Kogi State, Mrs. Salome Abu, and held a minute silence in honour
of the deceased.
These resolutions were sequel to the adoption
of a motion titled: ‘Curbing Electoral Violence’,
sponsored by Senator George Sekibo, who
quoted report of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) saying about 58
people were killed in 61 incidents of election violence across 22 states in the
country between January and February 2015.
He observed that political thuggery increased in
2019 compared to previous elections, adding that privileged politicians use
either armed thugs or security agents to disrupt smooth elections.
According to him, the recent violence witnessed
during and after the elections in Bayelsa and Kogi States has called to
question the credibility of the electoral process in Nigeria.
He said: “The resultant effect of the electoral
mayhem would reduce the credibility of our electoral process and deepen hatred
as well as widen the gap of our unity.
“The country’s electoral management body is not
strong enough to withstand the pressure exerted by the political system and the
electoral misconducts that accompany it continue to threaten the deepening of
democratisation process.
“This negative effect of electoral violence in the
country would continue to reduce the citizens' confidence in the democratic
process as well as heighten the fears of possible democratic collapse.”
While contributing , Senate Minority Leader, Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe, condemned in no
uncertain terms the violence reported in the two states.
He stressed that people have been known and seen to
perpetuate violence and nothing has been done to them.
According to the senator, "Once nothing is
done to somebody who commits crime, once nobody pays the price for criminality
of this nature, it only creates further violence, and so what we should also
add there that the law enforcement agencies must be up to task.
"The husband of the woman who was killed in
Kogi State has identified those who killed his wife, and till today, nothing
has been done to them, all that we have been hearing is all manner of excuses, and
if you don't curb it through the use of enforcement, you will only see that
pattern continue to grow, so we would want to urge all the legal instrument
that can be used in this country to be able to curb electoral violence."
On his part, Senate Leader, Senator Yahaya
Abdullahi, emphasised that the issue of electoral violence has been with
Nigeria for a long time since the emergence of this republic in 1999.
He said: "The specter of violence and its
attendant consequences are some of the unhealthiest events in the country, and
for which I believe that all of us (politicians) irrespective of the various
parties we belong to have a responsibility to address and curb it, otherwise we
will all become victims.
"So there is the need for us to urge the
security agencies to really do their jobs. They should arrest and bring to book
the perpetrators of the dastardly act, who are already known. It is important
if the minority leader and I can come up with a by-partisan bill to look at the
punishments for electoral violence, and see how we can make a law to
effectively tackle electoral violence because electoral violence knows no
partisanship. All politicians on all sides are guilty.”
The Senate, thereafter, condemned the spate of electoral-related
violence in the country and observed a minute silence for all those who lost
their lives in the recent electoral violence in Bayelsa and Kogi States.
While urging the National Orientation Agency (NOA)
and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to carry out a
detailed campaign against electoral violence in subsequent elections, the
Senate further advised the security agencies to expeditiously apprehend
perpetrators of electoral violence in all the areas where they occurred and
bring them to book.
Summing up contributions on the bill, Senate
President, Dr. Ahmad Lawan, described the motion as a very important one,
adding that "the minority leader and the Senate leader spoke the minds of
all of us here.
"No party is free from this blame, and it is
for us politicians to continue to enlighten our people to face politics as a
game of ideas.
"I believe that those who perpetrated violence
especially in the last elections in Bayelsa and Kogi States should be
apprehended and prosecuted. I believe that this is the way to go; people should
pay the price of their actions."
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