The National Conscience Party (NCP) said it would seek an order of mandamus from court to compel the Lagos State Government to conduct Local Government election before the end of 2016.
Mr Ayodele Akele, the National Secretary, NCP, said this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), on Monday in Lagos.
According to him, the party’s resolve to go back to court was to ensure that the state government carried out its constitutional responsibility as early as possible.
It would be recalled that NCP had in Oct. 23, 2015 filed a suit at a Lagos High Court against the State Government for failure to conduct election into the Local Council.
The suit also was against the appointment of caretaker committees to manage the local councils in the state.
However, the court ruled that appointment of caretaker committees to manage the affairs of the local government Areas was illegal and unconstitutional.
It ordered the State Independent Electoral Commission to conduct elections in all local government within 30 days.
The Lagos State Government appealed the judgments.
Akele said, “we have observed that they are not prosecuting the appeal diligently; they are just using it to kill time which is not good for our democracy.
“Perhaps their apprehension is that if they conduct the Local Government election, they may lose.
“We are going to file another suit asking for order of mandamus to stop further remittance of allocation to illegally constituted local government sole administrators,’’ he said.
The NCP scribe said inasmuch as the state government was still receiving money from the Federation account; there was no way it would be in a hurry to conduct council election.
He said if Lagos state government received threat that there were moves to stop further remittance of allocation to council, it would carry out its constitutional responsibility as early as possible.
Akele said that the party would write to President Muhammadu Buhari and the Minister of Finance on the matter.
He added that although NCP was preparing for the election but had no trust in the present composition of the state electoral commission.
He faulted the composition of the commission, saying opposition parties were not represented, alleging that the composition was made up of members of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
“We in the opposition cannot trust Lagos State Independent Electoral Commission (LASIEC) to conduct a credible election in the state, because the composition is questionable.’’
He, therefore, called on the commission to live a legacy of conducting a free and fair election. (NAN)
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