The Federal Government may defy
the Court of Appeal judgement
barring the use of soldiers in the
conduct of elections in the country,
Saturday PUNCH has learnt.
A top government official, who
pleaded anonymity, in an interview
with one of our correspondents on
Thursday, gave an indication that
President Goodluck Jonathan might
order the deployment of soldiers
for the March 28 and April 11
general elections.
The official was responding to a
question on what step the
President will take on the letter
written by the All Progressives
Congress in which it called
attention to the court order.
He said there was no issue in the
matter as Ekiti State Governor, Mr.
Ayo Fayose, had replied the APC on
the matter.
He said the governor’s response
was enough.
The Ekiti State governor was
quoted on Thursday to have said
Jonathan would continue to deploy
soldiers for elections in the
country.
The governor had further said that
the APC did not want the military to
be involved in the elections in
order to have the opportunity to
perpetrate violence during the
elections.
“It is the constitutional right of
President Goodluck Jonathan to
deploy soldiers to provide security
anywhere in Nigeria and not even
the APC allies in the judiciary can
take away this right,” Fayose was
quoted as saying.
The governor added in a telephone
conversation with one of our
correspondents on Thursday night
that it was the responsibility of the
Federal Government to ensure law
and order and protect the nation’s
citizenry.
Special Adviser to the President on
Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben
Abati, could not be reached for
comments at the time of filing this
report.
But the Special Adviser to the
President on Political Matters, Prof.
Rufa’i Alkali, who also spoke to
Saturday PUNCH on Thursday,
confirmed the response of the top
government official.
He said military troops would be
deployed to protect the lives and
property of Nigerians before,
during and after the elections.
Rufa’i said only people with sinister
motive are afraid of the
deployment of troops.
Alkali said, “Soldiers, as far back as
when Edo State Governor, Mr.
Adams Oshiomhole, was being
elected, were deployed and
Oshiomhole even with his
radicalism swallowed his pride and
came to thank the President for
supporting the elections with
adequate security.
“Now, look at what happened in
Ekiti, when they lost they were
crying but when the military was
also deployed in Osun and they
won they kept quiet.
“I challenge them to say since they
didn’t want the deployment of
security for elections, and soldiers
were deployed for the Osun
election, I thought they were going
to reject the outcome of the Osun
elections but they didn’t. What the
APC is doing is crass opportunism.”
The Peoples Democratic Party
national leadership refused to
comment on the court ruling,
preferring to concede the decision
on the type of security officials to
be used for the elections to the
Independent National Electoral
Commission.
The PDP National Publicity
Secretary, Mr. Olisa Metuh, in an
interview with one of our
correspondents, said the security
measure being planned by the INEC
should be enough to guarantee
free, fair and crisis-free elections.
When asked to be specific if he was
satisfied with the Court of Appeal
ruling which barred the
deployment of soldiers for
elections, he said he needed to
study the judgement first.
Metuh said, “Well, I need to study
the judgement and seek the
opinion of our legal adviser. But
suffice to say that we believe that
the army is doing a marvellous job
and that by the time we are due for
the elections, there would not be
any security crisis in any part of the
country.
“Also, we are of the opinion that
any security plan being put in place
by the INEC would be acceptable
and enough to have peaceful
elections.
“We would work with the electoral
body to have free, fair and
acceptable elections across the
country.”
Meanwhile, INEC has said that
soldiers will not be deployed at
polling units during the elections.
The Chief Press Secretary to the
INEC Chairman, Mr. Kayode Idowu,
stated this in an electronic mail
exclusively sent to one of our
correspondents on Thursday in
Abuja.
Idowu was responding to an
enquiry from Saturday PUNCH on
the deployment of the military for
the elections in view of the recent
court judgements barring soldiers’
involvement in polls.
He acknowledged that the military
would provide peripheral security
cordon such as manning entry
points into towns to check the
trafficking of arms that could be
used to disrupt the elections.
Idowu said, “They are also
positioned in covert readiness for
rapid deployment if there is a
security crisis beyond the capacity
of the police to handle. The military
are never near polling units.”
According to him, under the
platform of the Interagency
Consultative Committee on Election
Security that was created in 2011,
the role of the military has been
limited to providing INEC with
logistics support.
This, he said, included Air Force
planes and Navy boats that will
transport election materials over
hazardous or difficult terrains
across the country.
He said, “As a matter of fact, all
security men at the polling units
are never armed. It is because
malevolent people could exploit
this and harm voters as well as
polling officials that the armed
agents are in readiness for rapid
deployment.
“(It is) only if occasion warrants it.
Luckily, occasion has not warranted
it since this security design was put
in place in 2011.”
The Court of Appeal in Abuja, which
affirmed Governor Fayose of the
Peoples Democratic Party as the
winner of the June 21, 2014
governorship election in Ekiti had
described the use of Armed Forces
in the conduct of elections as a
violation of Section 217(2)(c) of the
Constitution and Section 1 of the
Armed Forces Act.
It cited a judgement delivered by
Justice R. M Aikawa of the Federal
High Court in Sokoto on January 29,
2015 barring the use of the armed
forces in the conduct of elections.
The appellate court therefore
barred the use of the Armed Forces
in the conduct of future elections in
the country as such constituted a
violation of both the constitution
and the Electoral Act.
However, the National Publicity
Secretary of the APC, Lai
Mohammed, in a phone
conversation with one of our
correspondents, questioned
Fayose’s claim that President
Jonathan would deploy soldiers for
the forthcoming elections in spite
of the Appeal court ruling.
He alleged that Fayose and the PDP
are in support of the use of the
military during the elections
because soldiers had rigged
elections for them in the past.
He said, “Is he (Fayose) the
Commander-in-Chief? Fayose wants
the military to be deployed
because he knows that was how
the election was rigged for him.
And they (PDP leadership) want the
military to be deployed because
the PDP wants the military to rig
elections for them.
“But what we are saying is that the
court of appeal has ruled that the
military has no business in election
duties. And we hope that Jonathan
will not only obey that ruling, we
will insist that soldiers are not
used.”
When asked what the APC would do
should the Federal Government
defy the court ruling by deploying
the military for the elections,
Mohammed said, “When we get to
that bridge, we will know how to
cross it.”
In a statement issued on
Wednesday, by his Special Assistant
on Public Communications and New
Media, Lere Olayinka, Fayose had
argued that the military was used
in governorship elections in some
states not won by the PDP in the
past, including Edo and Ondo.
Also recently, an audio recording
surfaced online alleging that the
last governorship election in Ekiti
State was rigged in favour of the
eventual winner, Fayose, with the
support of the military.
The audio file released by Sahara
Reporters, an online medium,
detailed how Fayose; former
Minister of State for Defence, Mr.
Musiliu Obanikoro; Senator Iyiola
Omisore; Minister of Police Affairs,
Mr. Jelili Adesiyan and the military
allegedly rigged the poll.
The audio recording was reportedly
made by one Captain Sagir Koli of
the 32nd Artillery Brigade in the
state, who was allegedly present at
the meeting.
The debate on legality of deploying
the military in elections has since
become a major subject of public
discourse.
A former Director of Army Legal
Services, Col. Akin Kejawa (retd.),
said there are provisions in the
Nigerian constitution and the
Armed Forces Act allowing the
deployment of soldiers for
operational use, which includes
providing law and order during
elections.
He, however, said the provision as
allowed by the constitution does
not give the military the right to
conduct elections.
He said, “Section 217 (2) says one of
the duties of the military is
suppressing insurrection and acting
in aid of civil authorities to restore
order when called upon to do so. So
if soldiers are deployed to maintain
law and order, that is supported by
both the constitution, as well as the
Armed Forces Act.
“This is the provision that
empowers the military to go out.
What we have in Nigeria- Boko
Haram- is a form of insurrection.
The military is covered under the
constitution as well as the Armed
Forces Act as long as the soldiers
don’t go and be taking ballot
papers.
“The fact that soldiers are present
at a polling centre does not mean
that they are conducting the
election. The military is not there
to conduct elections because INEC
officials, the representatives of the
parties and the international
observers are there. I don’t think
it’s illegal for the military to be
deployed for elections as long as it
is for the maintenance of law and
order.
According to Kejawa, the law also
gives the President the powers to
deploy the military in maintaining
law and order in the country,
particularly to aid civil authorities.
He said, “Section 8 (1-2) of the
Armed Forces Act specifically states
that the President shall have power
to deploy the armed forces for
operational use. It goes further to
state that the President shall have
power to delegate the power to
deploy armed forces for
operational use to either the Chief
of Defence Staff, Chief of Army Staff,
the Chief of Naval Staff and that of
the Air Force Staff as the case may
be.
“Section 3 (
defines what is
meant by the operational use of
the armed forces. It includes
provision of aid to civil power.
“If you go to Section 239 of the
Armed Forces Act, it says where the
army provides aid to civil power, it
can never be liable for anything it
does, that is, any act of omission or
commission they commit in the
process of providing aid to civil
power.
He condemned using the military
to intimidate members of
opposition parties, saying the
military should apply
professionalism in their duties.
He said, “I don’t support that the
military should be politicised since
they are subject to the political
authorities. The President is the
person who orders the operational
use of the military.
“But using the military to
intimidate the opposition is abuse
of power. That is where the
professionalism of the military
comes in. The military should not
be used to intimidate political the
opponents, when they are
maintaining law and order, it is not
the members of a political party
that they are there to protect, but
everybody. So they are not there
for political objective, they are
there
by ROTMANLUV 2023-07-08, 17:34
