Judges’ role must be limited in election matters – Bewaji

Dr. Wunmi Bewaji, a former Member of the House of Representatives, speaks on the 2019 general elections and expresses reservation in “judicialisation” of elections in Nigeria. The Executive Secretary of Coalition of Democrats for Electoral Reform (CODER) also says party leaders and not judges should determine winners of primaries.   Before the 2019 elections, many […]

Dr. Wunmi Bewaji, a former Member of the House of Representatives, speaks on the 2019 general elections and expresses reservation in “judicialisation” of elections in Nigeria. The Executive Secretary of Coalition of Democrats for Electoral Reform (CODER) also says party leaders and not judges should determine winners of primaries.

 

Before the 2019 elections, many party primaries were resolved in courts, are you satisfied with the pronouncements of the courts?

We must be careful because we have situation where a political party sponsors a candidate of another party. That has happened a lot, and it is still happening. For party elders, there must be a structure, and that is why you have the Board of Trustees (BoT). You also have the National Working Committee (NWC) and so the elders of the party, as represented by the BoT, must be given a say.

There should be no internal democracy that should go beyond the elders’ committee because if you go to court, it will be determined by one man who, for lack of better words, is not even aware of the history of the party.

Are our judges not trained on the complexities of party politics?

Look, in all other facets, maybe in finance, and all that, judges are trained specifically. As a lawyer, this is what I know. If you want judges to handle maritime cases, they are trained for such. If you want them to handle sophisticated matters coming from the securities and stock exchange, shares and debentures, you must train them for that purpose.

Since 1999, when was the last time judges were trained in democracy? Do we have to assume that judges know democracy? Don’t forget that we have pervasive political illiteracy in our system. You may see a professor, but he may not be politically literate.

Are you now saying we should no longer involve judges in pre-election matters?

What I am saying is this, the role of judges must be limited. The organs of the party must be strengthened by law; this is internal democracy. INEC can come in and say, “Look, you have to strengthen your organs.” When you strengthen your organs, you have the NEC of the party. The reason why outside of the NEC, you have the NWC, outside the NWC, you still have the BoT is that any complaint that goes through the party to the level of BoT should end there, not in the court. When we free the court of this, it can do some other work.

Also, in the constitutions of these parties are provisions that say you must explore and exhaust the remedies there before going to court, but now the first thing is people go to court without even exploring those remedies. So, the court must now tell them, go back to your party and resolve this. And then probably now, we amend the Electoral Act to say any issue relating to party primary must be dealt with by the internal organs of that political party.

What about the main elections, considering that many cases arising from elections are currently before tribunals?

For the elections proper, we also must define it. What are the situations where somebody can challenge an election in court? If you say there was violence, again the violence would affect everybody, as well as members of all the 93 political parties, so that should not be the reason so long as the election held on that particular day. The fact that you are able to come to court to say oh, there was violence here and there, then you are not going to be able to say that such violence affected only your own supporters such that they were not able to come out and vote. So, the court should not be the one to say that, the electorate should be the one to say, “You are the winner”, or “You are not the winner”.

But if you give that power to the court, you are undermining our democracy. It is also undermining the stake of the average voter because if he thinks that the loser, by going to court can buy his way in the court room, will also not be so encouraged to come out to vote.

What do you think is the solution?

In Nigeria, I have said it before, an election is free and fair where the person has won. If he loses, then it is not free and fair. We have to factor this into whatever solution we want to proffer. But at the end of the day, if we are having 93 political parties, if they are all fielding candidates, that would mean 92 persons are going to lose that election.

How will you rate INEC as the EU and the US are critical of its 2019 performance?

The comments of the EU and the US are unwarranted and self-serving.  Were they not the same people that dealt with Abacha? People that were dealing with Abacha have no interest in our democracy. Are the elections in EU and US perfect? Look at what is happening with Brexit. After three years, the Brexit is yet to take effect. They cannot even handle it. Where are the so-called foreign observers today? Apart from releasing some few paragraphs, did they go back to review the data as we the domestic observers have done?

What is your submission on voter apathy?

It is not good for any democracy. The national average is 34 per cent. It is even worse in some states. In Lagos it is 18 per cent. Even the number of uncollected PVCs is high. I think the democracy itself is under threat and the threat is not coming from the military, but the army of lazy Nigerians who think that the only thing they want to do is to talk on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and criticise the government.