I read your article on the above subject in today’s Daily Trust (Tuesday, August 21, 2018, page 43). The headline and conclusion were rather surprising. You seem to suggest that the registration of parties is not a constitutional matter and that INEC has the power or duty to refuse registration of Associations which fail to articulate any ideology or whose ideology or aims and objectives are identical to those of an existing party. Not restricting registration along these lines, in your view, shows its complicity in the undesirable proliferation of parties.
In making these assertions or drawing these conclusions, it would appear that you are not aware or did not advert your mind to the provisions of the 1999 constitution on the registration of political parties and the interpretation of these by the Supreme Court in the case of Balarabe Musa and others V. INEC. The Court held that registration of political parties is a constitutional matter and no law or INEC guideline can add to, subtract from, or contradict the provisions on the subject. True, it is empowered to issue guidelines but such must be complementary handmaids. In other words, INEC cannot add other conditions not stipulated in the Constitution. To act as you have suggested is tantamount to INEC, a constitutional body, subverting the rule of law, disregarding the constitution, which is supreme, and disobeying the Supreme Court. Such has no place in a democracy.
If in your opinion there are too many parties, the solution will be to amend the Constitution, not to ask INEC to ignore it and the Supreme Court’s interpretation and consequential orders, disobedience to which is contempt of the highest court in the land.
You may wish to also note that the Electoral Act stipulates that where INEC does not register any association seeking registration as a party and does not inform the association in writing and give reasons for its non-registration within 30 days of receipt of such application, the association is deemed registered.
It is for these reasons that INEC is obliged to continue to register all associations that meet the constitutional requirements. It’s a matter of constitutional duty and not one of discretion or for the ulterior motives so uncharitably ascribed to it in the article.
You may wish to take a look at the provisions of the Constitution and the judgment referred to above. I am sure it would be of great benefit to your readers if you correct the erroneous impressions that they may have formed from reading your article under reference.
Oluwole Osaze Uzzi, Esq., Director, Voter Education & Publicity, INEC
