Dasuki: Enemy Or Friend?

Service Chiefs’ Volte Face

This formed the basis of the meeting of Jega with INEC’s National Electoral Commissioners, the 37 Resident Electoral Commissioners of the states, the political parties and civil societies’ organizations last Saturday. This magazine gathered that to make the postponement of the elections a fait accompli, the Service Chiefs, led by Air Marshall Alex Badeh, the Chief of Defence Staff, CDS had also written the INEC Chairman indicating that they would not be able to provide security for the elections at the scheduled dates. But before now, the military chiefs had repeatedly assured the nation that elections will hold in all parts of the country, including the North East.

The CDS had told journalists in December last year after a breakfast meeting with the President that elections will hold in all parts of Nigeria including the North East. Also, the Service Chiefs had, at a meeting with political parties on 2 February, assured that they were ready to provide security for the elections at a meeting convened by former Head of State, General Abdusalami Abubakar in Abuja. The CDS told representatives of the political parties at that occasion that “even though we are busy in the North, we have capability across the nation.”

Badeh’s assertion was supported by Kenneth Minimah, the Chief of Army Staff who also said at the meeting that the armed forces were aware of the need for security before and during the elections: “We will deploy soldiers across the states of the federation in areas we discover that have capacity for violence. We are prepared to ensure that we have peaceful elections.” Air Marshall Adesola Amosun, the Chief of Air Staff also assured that the Air force had begun the airlifting of electoral materials to different parts of the country.

John Oyegun, the Chairman of All Progressives Congress, APC therefore wondered what has influenced the change of minds of the military chiefs three days later. “However, only three days later on Friday February 6, these same Service Chiefs wrote to INEC, in a letter, which by all practical purposes could be described as a blackmail, saying they would no longer be able to provide security for the elections. What happened in those 72 hours that brought about this complete volte-face?” queried Oyegun. The APC Chairman who posited that the postponement of the elections may be part of the larger plan to foist a constitutional crisis on the country and prolong the tenure of President Jonathan added that the behaviour of the leadership of the military show it has been sucked into the vortex of PDP and President Goodluck Jonathan’s re-election game plans.

Also, sources within the military told this magazine last week that the claims of the postponement of the elections because of security was a ruse because only a small number of Nigerian troops are currently deployed in the North East.

A coup Against Nigeria Democracy

Festus Okoye, National Coordinator of the Independent Election Monitoring Group, IEMG, in a statement on the issue said the reasons given for the postponement of the elections are not convincing, cogent and verifiable. “We view the postponement as unwarranted and a coup against the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and the Nigerian people and therefore unacceptable. We condemn the decision by the security agencies and forces not to provide security for the February 2015 elections. The said decision is a coup against democracy, the constitutional order, the electoral process and the Nigerian people,” Okoye said in a statement which depicted the gale of condemnations that have greeted the delay of the polls.

The United States, Canada and the European Union among other foreign countries while also condemning the shift in election dates, warned the Federal Government against politicizing the security challenges of the country and they also asked the military to refrain from direct intervention in the democratic process. Speaking at a media chat obviously organized to deflect the criticisms and allegations of government’s involvement in the polls shift last Wednesday night, President Jonathan said he was not in any way involved in the process that led to the decision to postpone the elections.

No, INEC Was Not Ready

But the President, like most of his supporters, had then gone on to claim that INEC was not ready for the elections, contrary to the claims of Jega. He added that in addition to the problems of Boko Haram, poor distribution of PVCs also constituted a security challenge for the country. “The day we held a meeting that led to this adjustment of the dates, in Lagos for example, only about 38 per cent of registered voters had their PVCs. That means that if we conduct elections in Lagos, 62 per cent of voters would not have been able to vote. Don’t you think there are security implications in that?” the President queried his interviewers.

Femi Fani Kayode, the Director General of PDP Presidential Campaign Organisation had also said the decision to postpone the elections never emanated from the government of President Jonathan as being speculated, but from the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) owing to the problem of logistics it encountered.

But critics noted that Jega had premised the decision to shift the polls on a strong advisory and a warning from the NSA and service chiefs that they could not guarantee security if the polls should go ahead in February. It was also the President’s security adviser, who gave the first hint that the elections would be postponed to allow more Nigerians collect their PVCs in London. And in the letter which finally forced INEC to shift the polls, Dasuki had cited security fears and no longer the problem of low distribution of PVCs. The President convened a meeting of the National Security Council which has as one of its functions, advising him on matters related to activities of INEC to discuss the issue of the poll shift. And when the Council failed to categorically support postponement, the military chiefs who owe their allegiance to the President as their Commander in Chief wrote Jega telling him that they will not have troops for deployment for election duties as they will be busy in the North East.