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April Polls: party chairman takes police to task over money
BY CHUKS EHIRIM
Newsdiaryonline Sun March 20,2011
National Chairman of the National Democratic Party[NDP], Prince
Chudi Chukwuani, has taken the leadership of the Nigeria Police
Force[NPF], to task over funds made available to it for
providing security during the forthcoming April general
elections in the country.
Chukwuani who spoke to journalists in Abuja, said the police
authotities must disclose the source of their funding in this
regards. This, according to the party leader, is To avert a
repeat of what happened in the past when elections were
allegedly rigged, by the ruling party, with the conivance of
policemen. He also asked Nigerians to hold the police
accountable for any such thing in the forthcoming
elections.According to Chukwuani, some African countries have
held their police accountable for situations like bad governance
and electoral fraud and they have succeeded in changing things
and Nigerians should not be an exception to this method of
change. He charged the police to make known the source of their
income to secure the forthcoming elections.
Chukwuani argued that any money collected by the Nigeria Police
Force, for the conduct of the April elections which was not
contained in the 2010 National budget, should be considered as
bribe from the ruling party.
The chairman faulted the
Inspector General of Police, Hafiz Ringim, who said that enough
funds have been given to the Nigeria police force to provide
security in the forthcoming elections.
The IGP had stated in an
interactive meeting between the police and political parties, on
violent free and fair elections, that the police have enough
funds to put in place security during the elections.
According to him, ''the
logistics for security during elections will be deployed this
week and the allowances of police officers that would be
deployed for the elections are in place''.
But Chukwuani in reaction to Ringim's position, said the police
should let the public know how much it has been given and the
source of the money.
“The thing is that we
must hold the police to account. Just like the people of Egypt
held their police and Army to account. Just like it is happening
in Libya now and the people of Algeria. We must hold them to
account. They are not the owners of Nigeria. All of us
collectively are the owners of Nigeria''.
''You see the electoral process manipulation starts when there
is no transparency. We met with the IGP and he told us that all
the security services have been meeting under the chairmanship
of the National Security Adviser, NSA. In the same breadth the
IGP told us that they made a special provision in the electoral
act for the responsibilities and duties of the police on
election. You can see contradictions. There is no where in the
electoral act that they said anything about the National
Security Adviser''.
“So, why will the police be holding meetings under the
chairmanship of the NSA when he has no constitutional role or
legal authority on anything dealing with election matters?''
“The second issue that leads to this manipulation, the IGP told
us that government –the PDP government – has made adequate
arrangements for their welfare and logistics. Everybody knows
what logistics is in Nigeria. If you ask an average Nigeria what
is logistics, he will tell you that its ‘egunje’. That is the
way we understand logistics. The IGP never defined what is in
this logistics; he never said this is how much that was
allocated. This money he is talking about is it part of the
federal budget or is it an extra-ordinary budget because
whatever the police use must come out from the federal budget''.
“So, it will not be a question of government given the police
money. What we expected the IGP to tell us is that in the 2010
budget, the national Assembly made a provision of this amount
for the use of police to supervise elections in 2011. That is
what he should have come out to tell us; that is what is called
transparency because our interpretation of what IGP said is that
the police have been bought off by the government in power. That
is our interpretation. Whatever the police do must be contained
in our appropriation so he should refer us to that section of
our national budget where the national Assembly had made
adequate provision for the monitoring of election and provision
of security by the Nigeria Police on the days of elections”.
Further he said “We are running a constitutional democracy and
the only place where any arms of government get money is through
appropriation bill. No where else. So if police is going to
supervise and provide security for elections, the vote should be
in the appropriation bill''. ''I
believe that every agency of government must wake up and live up
to its constitutional responsibilities and live by the code of
transparency in government''. ''I
believe that the IGP should go back and ask his finance people
to please pull
out the 2010 appropriation Act and look for the areas where the
National Assembly had made provisions for the police to use for
elections. If it is not there, then he should go back to the
National Assembly for them to make an appropriation to that
effect. Police should not accept any illegal money whether it is
coming from government or wherever it is coming from. If
government is giving them money, the police should ask the
government please what portion of the appropriation bill are you
using? That is what is expected of our institutions and the
failure of this was what Hillary Clinton saw and said
institutions have failed in Nigeria. Police cannot stay and
somebody will call it and give it lots of money. They have to be
worried and asked what is it for? Is it not bribery? So you have
to ask as an institution,
please what portion of the appropriation Act am I receiving
this money from so that
if I am asked I will be able to point to it. That is
transparency in governance, “ Chukwuani said.
Reacting to what Nigerians should do to protect their
votes against the position of
a Presidential candidate that any body that commits electoral
fraud should be lynched, the party national chairman said,
“Vigilance. Nigerians have to be vigilant; Nigerians must
protect their votes. I don’t subscribe to the one of taken the
laws into you hands – lynching. I don’t believe in public
lynching because that is a banana republic. If you see somebody
that is manipulating the electoral process, try and apprehend
him and hand him over to the police and then follow through with
the police making sure that the police prosecute the person and
holding the police responsible. That is what I will subscribe
to”.
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