We Were Under Pressure To Ask INEC To Cancel 2023 Polls Which Brought Tinubu — Gen Abdulsalami’s Peace Committee
NPC disclosed that the most significant call was related to the 25% threshold for Abuja as the Federal Capital Territory.
The National Peace Committee (NPC) has stated that it was pressured to get the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to either halt collation of results or cancel the 2023 Presidential Election which brought President Bola Tinubu.
NPC disclosed that the most significant call was related to the 25% threshold for Abuja as the Federal Capital Territory.
The former Head of State, General Abdulsalami Abubakar-led committee made this known on Friday in Abuja, when it presented to the public its 106-page report of the 2023 General Elections titled, “Nigeria’s Pursuit of Electoral Compliance: National Peace Committee NPC 2023 General Elections Report”.
The committee asserted that some of the requests wanted the NPC to prevail on INEC to stop collating election results because there were gross violations and lack of compliance with the electoral act.
It added that others demanded that the tenets of the Peace Accord signed were not adhered to and therefore the Committee should call for cancellation of the election entirely.
Part of the report reads; “As the election day progressed, criticisms and counter criticisms became abundant. The NPC was already being faced with a flurry of phone calls and the need to call INEC to order.
“The Peace Committee was flooded with requests for intervention. Both the Chairman of the Committee, General Abdulsalami A. Abubakar, the Convener, Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah and the Head of NPC Secretariat, Fr. Atta Barkindo, were inundated with calls, requests, and petitions demanding the intervention of the NPC.
“Some of the requests wanted the NPC to prevail on INEC to stop collating election results because there were gross violations and lack of compliance with the electoral act. Others demanded that the tenets of the Peace Accord signed were not adhered to and therefore the Committee should call for cancellation of the election entirely.
“The most significant call was related to the 25% threshold for Abuja as the Federal Capital Territory. Some of the analysts who reached out to the committee asked that the final election result should not be announced because the resumptive president-elect did not score the required 25% as stated in the electoral act. If anything, there should be a runoff.
“For example, the Centre for Reform and Public Advocacy described the silence of National Peace Committee (NPC) as deafening in spite of the avalanche of election petitions and likely far-reaching outcomes that could follow the decisions. The Centre stated that the NPC led by General Abdulsalami Abubakar (retd) had prior to the 2023 elections engaged political leaders on the need for a peaceful and credible election.
“However, what was missing was a post- election formal statement of the NPC on the outcome of the election and the sort of intervention needed to prevent widespread violence.
“The biggest bone of contention was the significance of the 25% threshold for the FCT, the vacuum created by pre-election legal interpretation that was not given by INEC.
“Within the general context of the mandate of the Peace Committee, there were requests that demanded the Committee to go beyond its mandate and to interfere in an electoral process that only agencies empowered by law can do so.
“The interventions provided by the NPC are purely and squarely moral, particularly in a context that trust deficit is widespread, the culture of impunity and lack of compliance with laws. The mandate is founded on the need to promote peace, prevent widespread violence and encourage parties and candidates to uphold the rule of law.
“The NPC has no mandate to arrest violators of process or interfere with the constitutional duties of INEC. It is set up to provide moral intervention, defined by mediation and moral persuasion to ensure that there is peace. It is also expected to, on behalf of public interest, speak truth to power when things are going terribly wrong.
“After the presidential elections, the NPC has continued with its engagements with political parties, youth and women led groups, persons with disabilities, the security agencies, traditional rulers and religious leaders, including the Independent State-based Peace Architectures.
“Most people are not aware that the NPC provides only a moral intervention, and it has no constitutional duty to arrest, punish or prosecute any citizen for any wrongdoing. Rather, the Committee has the moral obligation to encourage, persuade and appeal to political actors, community leaders and other stakeholders on the importance of peace.
“This limited awareness has forced some Nigerians to question the significance of engaging with the NPC if only what the committee brings to the table is moral persuasion. This is a challenge for the work of the Committee” the report added.
