Reconstructing Nigeria for Prosperity (1).

By Chukwuma Charles Soludo

In my 2005 National Democracy Day Lecture, I strongly argued that “for sustainable democracy, fundamental changes are required in the constitution, the electoral system, the fiscal federalism, as well as a gamut of legal-institutional reforms that are developmental and capable of promoting private enterprise and competition”. Seven years later, I feel more strongly about this point, and almost a sense of urgency to it. In the last two years, I have given several lectures on Nigeria’s dysfunctional political economy. I am glad that constitutional amendments are being debated. At least, let us start the talking. There is a systemic failure, and our institutions cannot take Nigeria on a sustainable path to prosperity.  In three articles, beginning with this one, I want to join the debate.

The word ‘restructure’ evokes all kinds of reactions. For some, it is a veiled campaign to dismember or weaken the Nigerian federation. I disagree. While I admit that Nigeria as a country or nation has been a colossal disappointment and a textbook example of “how not to do it”, I disagree that the solution is to dismember or weaken it.

I have three strong reasons to be a believer in one united and prosperous Nigeria. First, I am a pan-Africanist--- an Nkrumaist in terms of Pan-African unity.  As a scholar, about 60 per cent of my research and publications are on African economies. I am one of those dreaming of the second USA, the United States of Africa (with 54 states, encompassing the current 54 countries, with Nigeria as the Texas of Africa). Our destiny is tied together—the rest of the world simply sees one ‘Africa’ as if it is a ‘country’ but we think of ourselves as different. Combined, the 49 sub-Saharan African countries account for barely two per cent of global GDP (the size of Belgium with 10 million people). I see Africa’s future increasingly within the context of a more fully integrated continent. Enough of my dreams: now back to reality!
Second, I am proud to belong to the “big country”, and wish that it could become the “next China”. Nigeria is Africa’s most populous and its potentially biggest economy. In today and tomorrow’s world, size matters. Europe will inevitably move towards greater ‘federal Europe’ if the euro is to survive, and other efforts towards agglomeration are going on around the world. Nigeria accounts for far less than one per cent of global GDP (indeed if Nigeria were to submerge under a volcano tomorrow, the world would only notice it as a humanitarian disaster). I cannot imagine Nigeria breaking into smaller groupings. I do not see any of the groupings that will ‘happily’ stay together under one union without its own internal contradictions and tensions as in the larger Nigeria.

Third, I am aware that the hangover of history makes any reference to the word ‘restructure’ by an Igboman to be viewed with suspicion. I hate to think of public policy in those terms but if it helps this discourse, I make bold to say that as an Igboman, I will never support anything that will threaten the unity of Nigeria. Igbos have the greatest stake in Nigeria, and therefore stand to lose the most in the event of (God forbid) any disorderly unravelling of Nigeria. An enterprising, itinerant people with huge population in a tiny land mass, Igbos (like the Jews) are in need of a large domain or market for their commerce without molestation or discrimination. They are everywhere.  Of the estimated 17 million Nigerians in Diaspora, I can bet that at least 10 million of them are Igbos. They dominate most markets, especially for motor spare parts, in Africa. Onitsha traders now suffer because of Boko Haram as their supply chains to and from many parts of the North are grossly diminished.

There is hardly any village in Nigeria or town in Africa without an Igboman, speaking the local language and probably owning a house and feeling much at home. Without fear of contradiction, I can assert that at least 80 per cent of the Igbo elite live outside of Igboland (mostly in Lagos and Abuja), and more than 70 per cent of the investments by Igbos are outside of Igboland. I know that more than half of Anambra’s population lives outside of the state. There is hardly any former public office holder (governors, ministers, senators, Reps, etc) since 1999 who lives in Igboland. As Mallam Nasir el-Rufai was quoted as saying sometime, Igbos have turned Abuja into their ‘sixth state’, and some estimates opine that Igbos constitute 30-40 per cent of Lagos State. Even traditional marriages are now celebrated anywhere. The reasons for these are for another day.

The point of emphasis is that Igbos have the greatest need to keep Nigeria or even Africa as one united and prosperous market. An elderly Igbo friend of mine summed it nicely: “in the 1960s Igbos fought to leave Nigeria and the rest of Nigeria refused; we lost our properties and lives; now that we have re-built them everywhere, we are going to fight to make sure no one else will leave the union: we are all in this marriage for better or for worse”. Enough said!

Our thesis here is that a society can only prosper under conditions of ‘good leadership’ as well as a ‘good system’ that supports competition and wealth creation. So far, the dysfunctional system and its perverse incentives that make it almost impossible to make sustained progress in Nigeria have received little attention in public discourse. For three consecutive years, Nigeria has retained the 14th position in the world as ‘a failed state’ (with Somalia as number one) and many people think it is a joke. I posit that any serious discussion of public policy that ignores this issue misses the point. We believe there is a systemic failure that cannot be fixed by ad hoc ‘reforms’ irrespective of the type of leadership.

We therefore use the term ‘restructure’ to refer to the gamut of transformations in the nature and structure of the Nigerian State and society away from the current entanglements with the pursuit of rents to re-establish the link between the state and the people/business, and to re-engineer a society where competition and hard work drive success. Let us divide Nigeria’s post-independence history into the pre-civil war (under the 1963 Republican Constitution and its provisions for competitive federalism under the regions and a revenue allocation formula that forced hard work and competition) on the one hand, and the post-civil war with its centralised, unitary-federalism, with the centre repeatedly ‘creating’ the unviable federating units each entitled to the free money from the centre.

On literally all accounts, the average Nigerian was better off in the first than under the second: per capita income in 1966 was about $1,000 and about $1,400 in 1973 and is currently about $1,200. In REAL terms, the average Nigerian today (despite Nigeria earning over $600 billion from oil since 1973) has less than half of the income in 1966; is poorer; has a shorter life span; with poorer educational system and infrastructure. All the industries and palm and cocoa plantations and groundnut pyramids built by the regions have collapsed.
Our current unproductive system was designed to keep Nigeria ‘united’ by creating a strong ‘centre’. In the process, we have neither a federation nor a unitary system (at best a corrupted unitary system). All incentives and institutions are designed around a command and control structure for sharing and consuming the lottery jackpot from God (oil rents). For fear of death, Nigeria has indeed decided to commit suicide! There is no incentive for productive governance. National politics of competition for the oil rents has assumed a life of its own. On a per capita income basis, Nigeria has the most expensive parliament in the world. Every village now wants to be a state to get its own ‘share’. Don’t talk about fiscal viability! Have you heard any state governor advertising the number of new businesses that were attracted to his state or number of private sector jobs created as ‘the’ key performance indicator? There is little incentive for such! Debate on leadership is about who will share and where he comes from. It is not about who has the best plans to create jobs and wealth. Because you don’t need any skills to share, just about anybody can be a ‘leader’. Our politics has become a road to nowhere.

We need good leaders but equally important, we need a competitive system that allows any potentially good leader to emerge and perform. To use the metaphor of football, you need good footballers in a good pitch to have great football. If you have 10 Lionel Messis in a team but you take them to play in a cassava farm as field, their talents and efforts may come to little. In fact, because the field is a cassava farm, the ‘best players’ that would emerge could be the street urchins. Our view is that the type of leaders thrown up under a democracy and the latitude they have for creative change depends upon the nature of the legal-institutional infrastructure and the incentive-sanction system. As an economist, I understand that to change behaviour, two keywords are critical: incentives and sanctions. Both summarise what are popularly termed ‘institutions’. An individual can make a difference but ultimately it is institutions that make all the difference.  You can assemble a thousand technocrats, each with his/her ‘reforms’ and at best their positive impact will be at the margin.

Nigeria is in a chicken and egg situation. How will the ‘good system’ emerge without ‘good leaders’ and vice versa? Leave this for our next articles!

To prepare for life without oil, we need a new road map, and the starting point is a new constitution for prosperity! We need to understand the institutional/constitutional design that makes United Arab Emirates (UAE) produce the world class city of Dubai with little oil while other oil-producing countries of the Middle East are not diversified. We need to understand the incentive system that enables the State of Nevada in the US to prosper despite not having any natural resource in a country with oil rich states. It won’t be easy to repair the havoc oil and the destructive politics around it have wreaked on the society, including destruction of the productive elite. But the time to start is now.

To move forward, Nigeria must review the content and meaning of its current political map; rights over mineral resources and land; tax jurisdictions; citizenship rights; fiscal responsibility and fiscal federalism; powers of the central vis-a-vis regional governments; elimination of the suffocating hands of the Federal Government on the regions; etc. It is an oxymoron to repeat the same thing over and over, and expect a different outcome. For a new Nigeria to emerge, new thinking and new ways of doing business must be in place.

Oil Wells Dispute: Jonathan Urged To Intervene.

HAMZAT BABA.

A body known as Kogi Youth Progressive Association has called on President Goodluck Jonathan to urgently wade into the crisis between Kogi and Anambra States over the ownership of oil wells located in Odeke community, in Ibaji Local Government Area of Kogi State.
The chairman of the group, Alhaji Bello Ibrahim who made the call in a statement made available to LEADERSHIP in Lokoja yesterday, urged the federal government to, without further delay, to recognise Kogi State as an oil producing state.
He faulted the decision by the Jonathan administration to designate Anambra State as an oil producing state, leaving out Kogi State, adding that the federal government should not be seen to be part of the problem.
He further observed that the crude which was to service the Orient Oil Refinery located in  Anambra State was actually situated  in Odeke community in Kogi State.
Ibrahim disclosed that the matter was first raised in 1994, but regretted that  nothing was done by the government at the centre during the period, insisting that the only way out of the impasse was to declare Kogi State where the crude was found as an oil producing state, along with other benefiting states.
He stressed the need for Governor Idris Wada to open up discussion with his counterpart in Anambra State, to avert any possible clash by the contending communities as was the case a few years ago.

2015: We’ll check rigging with high-tech voters’ cards – Jega.

BY EMMANUEL AZIKEN, POLITICAL EDITOR
…Says Ondo election success will surpass Edo
PRofessor Attahiru Jega, Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC and one-time national leader of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, alongside senior officials of the INEC were in Lagos last week for an in-house strategic retreat.
Held in close collaboration with the Democratic Governance for Development, DGD Project, the retreat, an initiative of the United Nations Development Programme, UNDP, was to produce a strategic framework to guide the commission in its plans towards enthroning a regime of transparency in its management of elections in the country.
On the fringes of the retreat, Professor Jega in an interview, spoke on the commission’s preparations for next month’s gubernatorial election in Ondo State, the readiness of the commission to fully turn the chapter in the poor conduct of elections and the prospects of a new style in the commission. Excerpts:
What exactly is your agenda at this retreat?
By the time we finish this retreat in Lagos we would have come up with carefully prepared draft of a strategic plan that will guide all our actions between now and 2015 so that we can we have the kind of elections that Nigerians would be very, proud of and we have no doubt that given the commitment of all the staff in INEC and given all the preparations that we have been doing that this is an objective which we can attain.
What are the specific issues that INEC would be considering in improving the credibility of the voters register?
As we prepare for 2015, our efforts to bring remarkable improvements are all inclusive and they cover all key areas of the commission’s activities.
Efficient election management
We want to be a very, very effective and efficient election management body, we want to be a body that creates a level playing field for all contestants and all political actors and we want to be a body that is transparent, that is committed and that has integrity in the way in which it delivers electoral services.

INEC Boss, Prof Jega

That means that we have to do a lot of restructuring and reorganization  to bring better service delivery. It also means that we have to do a lot of training and re-training and we may also do some recruitment to bring additional competent hands to further improve on the efficiency and effectiveness of our work.
It also means that we have to do a lot of stakeholders’ engagement. We have to improve our relationships with all the critical stakeholders, from the government to the National Assembly to the political parties to civil society organisations. And the strategic planning process we are working on creates a framework where all of these activities will be carried out on a more sustained basis in order to keep on bringing remarkable improvements as we move towards 2015.
We are asking about the voters’ register?
As you are aware, when we did the registration in January and February 2011 we registered about 73.5 million voters. We intend to produce permanent voters’ cards in two major batches to ensure that every registered voter has a permanent voter’s card.
We have already given the contract for the first phase of this and as I speak with you, our hope is that before the end of this year we will commence the distribution of the permanent voters’ cards for about 40 million registered voters and by next year we hope to complete the distribution of the permanent voters’ cards.
The permanent voters’ cards are very good and in fact, unique in the history of this country because it is a chip-based card. Each card will contain a chip, which carries all the details and information about the registered voter from his photograph to his fingerprints to all the additional information that have been captured about the voter.
Our hope is that by the time we get to the 2015 elections we intend to deploy card readers in each polling unit, such that any person who comes to vote will easily be identified whether he is the legitimate holder of that card. That will go a long way in reducing some of the irregularities that Nigeria is famous for when it comes to election and abuse of voters’ cards.
How prepared are you for the Ondo election given reports that secret registration is already on?
There are all sorts of allegations and obviously, some of these allegations are for us to investigate fully and take remedial measures. And the security agencies are also to investigate these fully.
I can tell you that we received a petition, we investigated the petition and we have seen from the petition that some sort of registration is taking place, but it is not INEC registration, we are not doing any registration in Ondo State and we do not know the purpose for which that registration is being done.
Fraudulent registration
In any case, even if people are doing fraudulent registration, of course the security agencies should be able to apprehend them and prosecute them successfully. But I want to assure you that there is no way anybody can do any registration and put that data into our data base. We have a data base in Ondo State and we have an exact replica of that base in the headquarters. At any point we cross check and see that there is any discrepancy in the data bases, we will identify them and it is easy to deal with.
Remember before the Edo elections there were similar allegations. There were allegations that some people had penetrated the Edo data base and had put illegal names and it turned out not to be true and I have absolutely no doubt that as I speak with you our data base in Ondo State and in the headquarters has integrity. It is intact and has not been compromised and if anybody attempts to compromise it, it is very easy to detect and apprehend him or her.
How prepared are you?
We are adequately prepared for Ondo and our hope and aspiration is that Ondo would be much better than Edo elections.

ANPP Leaders Optimistic over Opposition Coalition.

By Onyebuchi Ezigbo in Abuja

There is growing optimism within the ranks of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) that the much-touted move by key opposition political parties to merge will come to fruition after all.

ANPP is joining two other leading opposition parties, the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) and Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) to plan for a possible merger to confront the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) at the polls in 2015.

THISDAY gathered that due to the interest and enthusiasm the merger issue has generated, the party has decided to further enlarge the contact committee on opposition merger talks to 20 members, including all its governors, senators and top leaders of the party.

According to party sources, members’ interests increased following considerations of its position in the political calculation with three states under its control.

This includes the possibility of the party members being considered for the top most position under the emerging common platform.
However, the move has been delayed as it was learnt that the plan by leadership of ANPP  to inaugurate a contact  committee on the merger talks was shifted because most of the members had gone on pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia.

Also, the inauguration planned to enable the committee to set out modalities for engaging other parties  in the coalition  was postponed because the national chairman, Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu, was still being expected from a trip to the United States.

A party source told THISDAY that the top hierarchy of ANPP, particularly the Chairman of the Board of Trustees (BoT), Senator Modu Sheriff,  are desperate  to go into negotiations with the other parties.

“Everyone among the progressives believe strongly that working in collaboration is the only way the opposition parties can stop the PDP and this is why all the parties are ready to make the necessary sacrifices to see that it succeeds,” he said.

Also, Onu who spoke in an interview with THISDAY, expressed the confidence of the party leadership that the proposed merger would succeed.

He said the party was already in discussion with other progressive opposition parties and that contrary to critics’ views that the talks will collapse, there was every reason to be optimistic over the success of the alliance this time around.

“We are working very hard on it. You know this cannot be easy but we are working in collaboration, we are talking to the major opposition political parties. 

“We are in discussion with them and we are very hopeful that by the end of the day we will able to secure an understanding that will help us to merge. 

“Our first option is to achieve a merger but if that is not possible, we settle for a coalition.  We started early this time, this has never happen before though many do not still believe it could be possible because they think it is difficult. 

“It has never happened before that discussions like this started early.  But I believe we have enough time to sort out all the problem that arise.

On the views that the opposition merger move is nothing but a marriage of convenience by parties with no common ideologies and that it will never work, Onu said those expressing such views are ignorant of the ideologies of most opposition progressive parties.

“I do not think that opposition parties involved in the talks have different views.  Out manifestos are quite similar and the new ANPP believe in the unity of Nigeria. We believe in a stable,  peaceful and prosperous country.  We also believe that there must be responsible leadership to offer service to our people so that Nigerians can get the best from their government.

“I feel that this one thing that binds all members of the opposition parties and there is a commitment that the time has come for us to provide this alternative platform that will help us get the desired Chang for the good of the nation,” he added.

Jonathan summons PDP govs, Tukur, others to crucial meeting.

BY HENRY UMORU
…Security, state police, excess crude, PIB top agenda
ABUJA—WORRIED by the security challenge in the country, especially with activities of Boko Haram sect where killings and destruction of property have been carried out, President Goodluck Jonathan has summoned the governors elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, to a meeting.
Vanguard gathered yesterday that others who have also been summoned to the meeting which will hold at the Presidential Villa today, are the PDP National Chairman, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, National Secretary, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola and Secretary, PDP Board of Trustees, BoT, Senator Walid Jibrin.
It was gathered that the meeting has become imperative to save the governors because the President was no longer comfortable with the situation where the governors sing different tunes when they ought to have agreed on a position when national issues come up for discussions.
The President is said to be unhappy because of discordant tunes by the PDP governors over the constitutional amendments, especially with regard to the demand for State Police, as well as activities of Boko Haram.

President Jonathan

Other issues that will feature in today’s meeting include the onshore/off shore dichotomy debate and the Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB.
A source at the party said, the PDP was pushing for a coordinated constitutional amendment. Vanguard was told: “The idea where the President, who is a product of the PDP would be continually at logger head with governors produced by the same PDP is not good for the polity. There are 36 governors, and 23 of them are from the PDP, yet they cannot speak with a voice, this is not good for the system; the meeting will endeavour to have a coordinated stand on issues.
Common stance on national issues
“It is expected that there would be a unified position at the meeting, especially as the National Assembly is about to reconvene from break.”
It will be recalled that there was a split among the governors under the aegis of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum, NGF, on the demand for State Police, just as it became a confrontation between the northern governors and the rest.
At the end of its meeting in Abuja, on July 27, the Northern governors had through their Chairman and Governor of Niger State, Dr. Mu’azu Babangida Aliyu said they did not agree on State Police at an earlier meeting of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum held June, 25 at the Rivers State Governor’s lodge.
According to the Northern States governors, “the forum was not in support of the creation of State Police. It however, resolved to prevail on the Federal Government to embark on Police Reform that will assist the states in control and management of Police affairs, and further emphasise on the sound philosophy for modern policing by amending the provision of section 215 of the Constitution.
Also recall that President Jonathan had said last week during the conference of the Nigeria Bar Association, NBA that Nigeria as a country was not ripe for State Police.
Strong indications emerged that there was crisis on the issue of on/off shore when the Northern Governors set up a committee to discuss the on and off shore dichotomy, just as they also directed their various Commissioners for Justice to discuss the implication of the on/offshore oil production and advice on the way forward.
Kano State governor, Rabiu Kwankwaso had spoken for the northern governors, when he stressed that the policy of on/off crude oil production was not acceptable to the northern governors.

Election Tribunal: Edo PDP Denies Alleged Compensation By Oshiomhole.

PATRICK OCHOGA.

Amid innuendos by some aggrieved Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, members in Edo State over the withdrawal of the party from the suit filed by its governorship candidate, Major General Charles Airhiavhere challenging the victory of Governor Adams Oshiomhole at the Election Tribunal, the party yesterday debunked the rumour making the rounds that the leadership of the party was ‘settled’ by Oshiomhole.
The party disclosed this in Benin in a press statement signed by the party’s Publicity Secretary, Matthew Urhoghide. Urhoghide in the statement explained the reasons why the party decided not to be joined in a legal tussle against Oshiomhole after the July 14th governorship election in the state.
He said the official position not to challenge either the result of the July 14, 2012 Governorship Election or any issue was reached after several prolonged meetings attended by strategic leaders and stakeholders of the party including the PDP flag bearer in the election.
 “Our party did not take a position a few days after the election. It took over three weeks to reach a decision and within which period a series of consultations and meetings were held to determine the best line of action. In its carefully considered opinion, Edo PDP decided not to challenge the election outcome at the Election Tribunal.
“We did not also come by the decision easily. The resolve not to go to court was as difficult for the leadership to arrive at as it must be for our numerous faithful and loyal members and supporters to come to grips with and accept.”
“It is malicious, wicked and unfounded for a group of people to bandy innuendoes and rumours suggesting that the leadership of Edo PDP accepted compensations to sell out their rights to challenge the result of the election. In fact, these same people are known to have worked against the candidate and party interest in the July 14, 2012 election. It is to our knowledge that the new aim of these people is to cause disaffection within the party, and strive to gain some sympathies and favours for themselves from top PDP leaders including the opposition party.
“For the avoidance of doubt, no money and promises of choice positions both in the local government offices and in Governor Oshiomhole’s cabinet were offered to and accepted by the PDP and no high-up leader of the party bargained the party’s rights away. The decision, reached by all at the said meetings, was simply a case of the right thing to do after responsibly and painstakingly weighing all the angles”, he added.

Attorney-Gen. to Jega: you’ve no CEO powers.

By Augustine AVWODE.

Adoke

Minister’s letter says chairman can’t be INEC’s accounting officer

Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) chair Prof. Attahiru Jega has lost out in his battle to hold tight to executive powers at the agency. 
Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice Mohammed Adoke has advised Jega to quit his role as the accounting officer of INEC.
There has been a running battle between Jega and some of the National Commissioners over the INEC chair’s alleged “acquisition of wide powers to himself”.
At a recent retreat in Lagos, the commissioners reportedly took the chairman up on such powers, which, in their view, are open to abuses. 
They also said if the chairman continued the way he had been running the body in “a one man show arrangement”, it could lead to a major crack in the leadership and endanger the agency’s future.
Some of them buttressed their argument that Jega had been obsessed with power with his request for sweeping powers for the INEC chair in his proposal for an amendment to the Electoral Act 2010.
Jega, had last May, requested the National Assembly to amend the 2010 Electoral Act to allow for electronic voting in 2015 and to give him powers to appoint the Resident Electoral Commissioners (RECs) because, according to him, “there is no clear sense of the relationship between RECs and the commission at the national level.” 
He added:  “We will like to be given a role in order to streamline authority structure within the commission.” 
The INEC boss said he wanted the electoral body to be allowed to sanction political parties that violate internal party democracy with a view to enhancing the democratic process.
He spoke at a retreat for members of the House of Representatives ad-hoc committee on the review of the 1999 Constitution in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital. 
Jega, who urged the National Assembly to expunge Section 52 of the Electoral law which prohibits the use of electronic voting machine in elections, was represented by Mrs Thelma Iremiren, a National Commissioner. 
To get the legal backing to his enormous powers, Jega had written a letter dated June 19, to Adoke, asking for clarification on who should be the accounting officer of the body.
He noted: “Since our assumption of office as a new Commission in July 2010, having regard to the fact that neither the Constitution nor the Electoral Act defined the role of the Secretary to the Commission as the Accounting Officer, I have considered myself as such, relying upon provisions of the Procurement Act, particularly Sections 18, 19 and 20 of the Act and Regulations issued by the Bureau of Public Procurement to the effect that in an MDA/Corporate procuring entity, the Chief Executive is the Accounting Officer.
“I have also done this, given the weighty personal liability which the Procurement Act places on the shoulders of the Accounting Officer. The tradition in INEC had been that a Permanent Secretary was posted as the Secretary, until 2008, when INEC, having regard to the provisions of the Constitution and Electoral Act appointed its Secretary. The functions/roles of the Secretary as specified did not say or imply that he is the Accounting Officer”.   
Jega told Adoke that the clarification was necessary in the light of the restructuring and reorganisation going on in the commission as it prepares for what he described as “better, effective and efficient service delivery towards 2015 and beyond”. 
He insisted that it was “pertinent to seek this clarification for the avoidance of doubt and in order to put lingering matters to rest.”
The “lingering matters” Jega spoke about, it was learnt, might not be unconnected with what a source described as the frosty relationship between the chairman and other commissioners over the chairman’s powers.
In a July 26 reply to Jega’s reply, Adoke declared categorically that the chairman is not the accounting officer of INEC.  
Adoke said: “I have examined relevant provisions of the law particularly, the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999, the Electoral Act, the Public Procurement Act and extant Financial Regulations in order to determine whether the law has expressly provided for the position of either the ‘Chief Executive Officer’ or ‘Accounting Officer’ of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
“Regrettably, it would appear that no such terminology was used in the statutes examined. Item 14(1)(a) of Part 1 to the Third  Schedule of the Constitution only provides that the  Chairman shall be the Chief  Electoral Commissioner. The provision does not state that the ‘Chief Electoral Commissioner’ is the ‘Chief Executive Officer.
“I have similarly examined the functions and powers of the Commission as provided for in item 15 of Part 1 of the Third Schedule to the Constitution and sections 2, 3, 4 and 5 of the Electoral Act and wish to observe that these are functions and powers that can only be exercised by the Commission and not by the Chairman or any individual Commissioner except as may be delegated by the Commission under Section 152 of the Electoral Act or item 15(h) of Part 1 to the Third Schedule to the Constitution.”
“Consequently, in the absence of any clear donation of the powers of a Chief Executive Officer or Accounting Officer by the relevant statutes, and in the absence of any evidence to indicate that these functions and powers of the Commission have been delegated to the Chairman, I am unable to come to the reasoned conclusion that the law contemplates that the Chairman of INEC shall be the Chief Executive Officer or Accounting Officer of the Commission,” Adoke explained.
 He added that the Electoral Act confers on the Secretary enormous administrative powers akin to those of  Directors-General, who are “statutorily the Accounting Officers and Chief Executive Officers of their various Commissions”. 
Adoke pointed out that this is what obtains in similar commissions, such as Police Service Commission, National Population Commission and Federal Judicial Service Commission.    
Some of the commissioners were said to have warned that unless Jega is checked, he could become a “dictator” as demonstrated by his actions after the Kogi State governorship election when Jega, who should be a disinterested party, directed that one of the contending candidates be sworn in as governor, fueling speculations that the electoral body has metamorphosed into a “game changer”.
 Jega’s actions are according to sources, believed to have been buoyed by his membership of the Justice Mohammed Uwais panel on Election Reform.