Omoyele Sowore, the presidential candidate of the African Action
Congress (AAC), has called on Amina Zakari, the embattled National
Commissioner of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), to
resign from her position.
Sowore stated this on Monday in Abuja during the INEC quarterly consultative meeting with political parties.
There
had been speculations on the relationship between the Oresident and
Zakari, with the presidency issuing a statement that the duo aren’t
related by blood but for an inter-marriage between their families.
Zakari had also said Buhari is neither her cousin nor her uncle as claimed.
Sowore
has, however, said Zakari’s sense of judgement in the line of duty
would be compromised, no matter the nature of her relationship with
President Muhammadu Buhari.
“It is not about the blood
relationship. If there is any form of relationship at all, that could
influence her sense of judgement. I expected her to do the right thing
by stepping aside. It doesn’t have to be blood relationship. There are
people who don’t have blood relationship in this world that are closer
than people with blood relationship,” he said.
Maintaining that
there is enough evidence to prove that Zakari would be biased in the
discharge of her duties, Sowore advised her to follow the path of honour
and resign from the position.
He said people are not comfortable
with her decision to remain in her position in the commission; he also
urged the commission to reverse the decision.
On the draft
guidelines, he stressed that all political parties must be included in
drawing up the guidelines for the regulation of the conduct of the
elections.
Speaking at the event, Professor Mahmood Yakubu, the
INEC Chairman, explained that where the biometric authentication fails,
the voter will be required to thumbprint a box next to his/her picture
on the register and would be made to enter his/her mobile telephone
number before proceeding to vote.
“The commission has modified
the register of voters for the 2019 general election accordingly,”
Yakubu stated. “Consequently, the separate incident form used in
previous elections which is only completed by the presiding officer
without the involvement of the voter, is now abolished. Similarly the
claim that the card reader has been enhanced ro recapture voters’
fingerprints at polling units and automatically overwrite the biometric
record on our database is untrue and should be disregarded.”
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