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EFCC, Bafarawa and Sokoto Re-Run Election By Makwashe Tambari Nigerian citizens were highly amazed by the hot news of the arrest on Wednesday May 7, 2008 by the EFCC of former governor of Sokoto state, Alhaji Attahiru Bafarawa over a petition on financial mismanagement while he was in office. Knowing fully how their country is faring, Nigerians were quick to condemn the arrest and considered the act as wrongly timed.
Even as
General Jeremiah Huseini and Bafarawa himself reputed the arrest story,
Nigerians suspect that for the Commission to invite Bafarawa now over a
letter he wrote to it over the state of finance he was handing over to
his successor in May 2007 shows that something must be wrong with its
modus operandi vis-à-vis its relationship with the ruling party.
Why should
EFCC delay the verification of Bafarawa’s claim, knowing fully its
implications for his integrity? Why now when some records must have been
tempered with by Wamakko’s administration? No wonder, people see the
move against Bafarawa now as one directly related to the re-run Sokoto
gubernatorial election ordered by the Appeal Court Kaduna, and whose
date has been fixed by INEC as May 24.
The verdict
greatly shocked many a politician, with the debate now ragging on
whether or not Wamakko and PDP can participate in the re-run election so
ordered. Most disturbing, Bafarawa who had been abroad for some time had
flew back into the country ready to win the state for his party.
While
severity of the Sokoto case is ignored by many, political commentators
and legal experts are quick to draw the attention of the powers-that-be
on its political consequencies. They had seen how Bafarawa was gallantly
welcome by the Sakkwata. The ruling party is in jittery as to DPP’s
claim that Wamakko is not qualified to take part in the re-run election
to be conducted in the state on May 24. It is thus speculated that a
combination of all this chain of events that made PDP come up plans to
cage Bafarawa, as Obasanjo did during the April 2007 election.
The concern
of the citizens is always not with ensuring public accountability by
political office holders but the means now being employed to achieve
that target. This, Nigerians must have came to realize during the days
of Obasanjo’s administration when only his opponents were being chased
by the EFCC. Anyway, his administration did not proclaim the rule of law
as one of its cardinal guiding principles.
Thus, when
Umar Musa Yar’Adua took over, his over emphasis on rule of law seemed to
convince all that the dark and barbaric days when security agencies and
government agencies were behaving the above the laws were over. However,
with the new administration’s agreement to work with the likes of
Saminus, Abba Bukars, Alieros and Yerimas, no one is left in doubt as to
deceit in Yar’Adua’s application of the concept of rule of law.
It sounds
more convincing that Obasanjo’s militaristic approach to politics is far
more straight forward than Yar’Adua’s hide-and-seek galleria of deceit.
Those who squandered public funds and agreed to be members of PDP or be
part of the notorious government of national unity are allowed to move
freely with all state protection accorded them. While those who
disagreed to either join the wagon of PDP or join the concocted unity
government are humiliated from all angles.
A testing
acid for Yar’Adua is in the on-going election petition judgements and
bye elections so far ordered and conducted. No doubt, Nigerians
expressed dissatisfaction with the way Yar’Adua’s son-in-law and
governor of Kebbi state was manouvred to escape being caught with extant
electoral laws. The general belief is that while the Sokoto state
governor had his election nullified, even as the petitions against them
were same, Kebbi state governor was spared because of his relationship
with the presidency.
Now that the
Appeal Court in Kaduna ordered for fresh election in Sokoto state, legal
experts as well as laymen and women are pondering which candidate and
party should participate in the re-run election. In this regard, the
Court ordered that only those parties and candidates that participated
in the April 2007 election are the only ones that should participate in
the ordered re-run election.
No sooner had
the verdict been passed, the citizens began to ask: since Wamakko’s
election was nullified due to his double nomination by ANPP and PDP and
his deputy’s forgery of oath of contest, are the duo now qualified to
contest the re-run election ordered by the Court? This is more serious
in view of the understanding of earlier verdict by same Court in a
related case where it was decided that ‘Where,
however, there is nullification of a general election and a re-run
election is ordered, only candidates who were lawfully nominated to
contest in the nullified election can contest the re-run election since
the date and period for calling for nomination and screening of
candidates had lapsed’ (emphasis mine).
It is this
interpretation that made many legal experts and public commentators to
opine that Wamakko is legally edged out of the contest for now. Some
nevertheless are of the opinion that had the verdict meant to disqualify
Wamakko or any other contending parties from the contest, it would have
said so very clearly. To this group, therefore, Wamakko can re-contest
since the Court verdict had not expressly bar him from doing so.
While all
this debate was going on, INEC went on media to rule that Wamakko can
contest. This further compounded the matter, since INEC’s pronouncement
carries no legal effect. We all know that it was same INEC that accepted
the double nomination of Wamakko for the nullified election that wants
to assume the responsibility of interpreting legal verdict in order to
confirm to those who do not know that the Commission is spineless body
ready to do the bidding of the ruling party.
The decision
by the DPP to go back to the Court to seek interpretation of the Kaduna
verdict is undoubtedly the best and far more democratic than the PDP and
INEC despotic approach. It is up to the Learned Justices of the Court
handling the case now to render a clearer and straight forward
interpretation of the Sokoto verdict. We all trust that whatever
interpretation is given to the verdict, it shall become a law that shall
apply to similar cases in our democratic voyage.
While we
await the interpretation of the verdict, we call on the Judiciary to
treat the case based on its merit and not based on who and which party
is involved. They surely have a history to make. Their integrity of the
Judges handling the case must never be compromised. The Judiciary
remains the last hope of the depressed, suppressed and deprived
citizens.
Makwashe
Tambari Sokoto,
Shop 45A,
Tashar Kura,
Unguwar
Rogo,
Sokoto
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