The Deputy Director of Publicity and Voters Education of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Mr. Nick Dazang, stated this in an interview with journalists in Abuja on Monday that the All Progressives Congress is yet to inform the commission about the death of its Kogi State governorship candidate, Prince Abubakar Audu. It however promised to apply available legal provisions to the last Saturday’s governorship election in Kogi State. He said in informing the commission of the death, the party must present a copy of the certificate of death of the deceased. Dazang said:
“The APC has to do proper notification and accompany it with the certificate of death issued by a medical doctor.
When something like this happens, the party on which platform the candidate contested will need to notify the commission; of course, we have heard and read like everyone else but we need to be notified.
“Once the commission is notified, it will look at relevant clauses of the 1999 Constitution as amended, the Electoral Act 2010 as amended and also the Constitution of the APC itself.
All these relevant laws will be looked at with a view to determining what to be done to ensure that whatever is done subsequently is done within the ambit of the law. INEC as a law-abiding body will do everything prescribed by the law.
“Thankfully, we have a consortium of Senior Advocates of Nigeria that provide counsel to the commission. We also have a very vibrant legal service department, headed by a SAN.”
Dazang said INEC would apply the relevant laws and make a pronouncement on its position on the election immediately it received official notification of Audu’s death from the APC. He explained that there were legal provisions to address such incident in the country’s electoral process.
He, however, said whatever the situation would be, Kogi election would not affect the Bayelsa State governorship poll as the commission had the capacity to handle the two elections. The late gubernatorial aspirant was buried on Monday according to Islamic rites.
Culled From Punch