Senior lawyer and human rights activist, Femi Falana has said that President Muhammadu Buhari is reluctant to give assent to electoral bill because the powerful governors in his party, are saying it is going to be expensive for them to run direct primaries.
Falana who said this on Wednesday December 15 at TheCable Colloquium, alleged that these Governors are scared of electronic voting because they know manipulation will be reduced.
He noted that same bill was rejected by the president in 2018 on ground of being too close to the 2019 election, and same excuse might be brought up.
Falana said;
“The president is reluctant to give assent to the bill because the powerful governors in his party, the ruling party, are saying it is going to be much more expensive for them to run direct primaries.
“Therefore, throw away the baby and the bath water. But where they’re actually going is that those governors have not recovered from the shock of having electronic vote. They know manipulation will be reduced to the minimum.
“That’s why they are asking the president to throw away that bill. They aren’t saying take it back to the national assembly so that the area of direct primaries can be removed.
“The bill can be rejected only on one ground. The 2018 bill was rejected by the president on the ground that it’s too close to the 2019 election. Now, the president may also say signing this bill now may be too close to the election and might cause confusion.”
