The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has said the Constitution did not stipulate the duration for re-submitting a petition for a legislator’s recall if the first attempt fails.
Naija News reports that INEC’s Director of Voter Education and Publicity, Victoria Eta-Messi, stated that Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan‘s recall petition was canceled because it did not meet the provision of the Constitution.
Speaking with Arise News on Friday, Eta-Messi said the Constitution was silent about the duration for re-submitting a recall petition against a lawmaker; she, however, wondered where the group that submitted the recall petition against the Kogi Central Senator would get signatures for the shortfall in the first petition.
Her words: “So the Constitution is silent on that. The law is silent on the recall process being started afresh. And we’re not sure, even if that were to happen, we’re not sure of the window that is required before a resubmission can be done.
“What the Commission did yesterday (Thursday) was to state that based on what was submitted earlier, the threshold was not met. They required 50% plus 1. But what was got during the physical inspection of the signatures was 43.8%.
“So as it is, what we have on ground has been done with. It is a done deal. And so that process has come to an end in line with the provision of the Constitution. So if they were to start afresh now, well, I don’t know. I don’t know what, the experts would advise us on that. But the law is silent on them representing. And how soon they should do that, we do not know.
“But when they come up with another petition, then I think we’ll cross the bridge when we get there. But then the issue is if they could only get 208,000 signatures, where are they now going to get the shortfall from? So that is a question to ponder.”
