By Tosin Olatokunbo
YIAGA Africa, a Civil Society Organisation, has cautioned political parties in the country against monetisation of next year’s election.
The Civil Society groups spoke ahead the All Progressives Congress, APC, National Convention coming up next Monday, where the ruling party’s Presidential candidate is expected to emerge.
Not a few Nigerians have expressed outrage over the high cost of nomination and expression of interest forms by the two major political parties in the country.
For instance, the ruling APC sold its presidential nomination form for N100 million, while the PDP sold their own for N40 million.
Also, many Nigerians expressed outrage over the last PDP National Convention where huge sums of money were believed to have been used to bribe delegates. The PDP’s Presidential flag bearer is Atiku Abubakar.
As a proof that money was actually shared to PDP delegates, one of the delegates from Kaduna, shared N7 million to people in his constituency out of his own share.
The Civil Society body said politicians must be discouraged from the use of money to buy votes.
In a statement on Friday, Samson Itodo, Executive Director of YIAGA, said political parties must ensure that candidates representing the party emerge through a transparent process, devoid of money inducement.
According to him, “As the country eagerly awaits the emergence of the Presidential flagbearers of most political parties, we wish to reiterate the strategic importance of fair and credible primaries in engendering positive democratic externalities within the context of the forthcoming civilian-to-civilian transition process in Nigeria.
“With less than a week to the June 9th deadline for the conduct of party primaries, Yiaga Africa reaffirms her earlier demand that candidates must, among other things, emerge from credible, rules-based primaries in line with democratic standards. Manipulated and stage-managed primaries remain antithetical to democratic ideals and must be prevented to the barest minimum.
“We thus call on political parties yet to nominate Presidential candidates to ensure they deliver Presidential Conventions that are not free and fair in the theoretical or abstract sense but in terms of intrinsic transparency and accountability in its accreditation, voting, and collation process.
“The so-called ‘dollar rain’ needs to be brought to a definitive end, and delegates sensitized on the necessity of voting their conscience over primordial and pecuniary considerations.
“Yiaga Africa urges INEC to enforce its regulatory powers against political parties that contravene provisions of the Electoral Act 2022 and INEC guidelines before, during and after the primaries,” the statement said.
