Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Professor Attahiru Jega, has refuted statements making rounds that he was pressured by the presidency to help swing the elections results in the favour of the presidency.
Jega who is leaving office June this year made this known yesterday in the morning programme of Hausa service of Voice of America while being interviewed on whether or not he was ever lobbied by the president to act in his favour.
He emphasized that ‘all the allegations that Jonathan had put so much pressure on me was not true’, adding that such attempt to compromise him had never taken place anywhere.
Instead, the INEC boss clarified that since he became the chairman of the commission, all the money he requested from the president were given to him completely.
Recall that there were pre-election accusations of plot by Jega to rig the elections.
Whlie series of groups and some opposition parties raised allegations of plots by the outgoing President, Goodluck Jonathan to compromise the INEC boss, the ruling party, PDP, also accused him of planning to rig the elections in favour of the All Progressives Congress, APC.
A front page advertorial by a group described by Jega as faceless in some National Newspapers alleged a plot by the Chairman of the Commission to rig the 2015 general elections. The group cited the constitution of a presidential election result collation committee by the INEC Chairman as the basis for its allegation that a plot to rig the election has been hatched.
Although INEC, described the allegations as total falsehood and baseless, there were growing concerns surrounding them.
The Commission affirmed that the allegation to manipulate or rig the election is completely false and baseless.
INEC said that the Chairman of the Commission as the Chief Electoral Commissioner of Nigeria and the Returning Officer of the presidential election, has statutory and legal powers to constitute administrative committee(s) to facilitate the performance of his duties. The constitution of an in-house committee to assist in the collation process after the presidential election is purely an administrative arrangement to assist the Chairman.
Members of the committee are officials of the Commission. They work as professionals and non-partisan technocrats and have sworn to the oath of neutrality in the execution of their official duties. They are drawn from the Operations, ICT and Legal departments of the Commission as well as the Office of the Chairman. This arrangement is not new and was the same as during the 2011 general elections.
However, the INEC boss has finally laid the matter to rest days after he announced the results of the presidential election, affirming that there were no attempt to compromise him on the elections.
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