Senate resolves controversy on successor of dead presidential, governorship candidates

ABUJA — THE Senate, yesterday, nipped in the bud the impasse that may arise from who succeeds a dead governorship or presidential candidate in case such a person dies before the announcement of an election result. Against this backdrop, the Senate approved a new bill that would provide for the conduct of a fresh primary within 14 days to choose the new candidate for such a party. The decision of the Senate is to guard against a repeat of what took place in Kogi governorship election on November 21, 2015, in which the governorship candidate, Prince Abubakar Audu, died before the result was announced and winner declared.

The Senate adopted this recommendation as it amended the electoral bill which also provides that the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, shall suspend the conduct of a new election for 21 days when the death of a candidate is recorded after the commencement of an election and before the announcement of result. These were contained in the report of the Committee on INEC, led  by Senator Abubakar Kyari, APC, Borno North. It is a report on a Bill for an Act to strengthen the Independent National Electoral Commission by giving it more powers, and providing for the substitution of candidates after the conduct of primary election in the event of death; and for related matters. It is also a Bill for an Act to Amend the Electoral Act No.6, 2010 and for other matters connected therewith. In the amendment, the new bill also provides a legal backing for the use of manual voting in situations where card readers malfunctioned. Whereas the manual option has always been adopted as an alternative to the malfunctioning of card readers, the new provision is meant to make the action legally valid. Meanwhile, the Senate could not pass the bill yesterday because it did not conclude its clause-by-clause consideration and the upper chambers thereafter deferred for further consideration of the bill till another legislative day.