THE Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD) has expressed shock over President Mohammad Buhari’s decision to decline assent to the Electoral Act Amendment Bill 2021.
The CDD, in a statement by its Director Idayat Hassan, recommended two immediate options for the National Assembly.
The organisation asked the National Assembly to either veto the president and pass the bill into an Act of the National Assembly or immediately remove the provisions on direct primaries as raised by the president and re-present the bill to him for his assent.
“We must not allow a single provision truncate the goodness in the proposed electoral bill.
“Nigeria is in dire need of a new and robust framework for the conduct of elections. The reform in the Electoral Bill 2021 will improve the quality of elections, thereby imbuing citizens trust in our democracy,” the group said.
Idayat said Nigerians were hoping President Buhari would write his name in gold but missed the opportunity.
The statement stated that the National Assembly, as the true representative of the people, must not allow the substantial human and financial resources that went into the Electoral Bill 2021 to be in vain.
President Buhari had, in a letter, withheld assent to the Electoral Act Amendment Bill, citing the imposition of direct primaries as approved by the National Assembly for picking candidates by political parties in the amended Electoral Act as a violation of the spirit of democracy.
A reporter with the ICIR
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