By Olusegun Lawrence The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has been accused of a deliberate attempt to cover up the alleged certificate saga of the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate, Muhammadu Buhari.
Femi Fani-Kayode, the spokesperson for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Presidential Campaign Organisation, made the accusation while addressing a press conference in Abuja on Saturday.
He said the inability of the APC candidate, Buhari, to present even the minimum requirement of just a leaving school certificate questions his moral and other credentials for pursuing the position of the president of Nigeria.
According to him, INEC may be engaging in acts that do not, in every material particular, support the advancement of democracy, the rule of law and the strict adherence to the letters and the spirit of electoral laws in Nigeria.
Fani-Kayode therefore, called on INEC to disqualify the APC candidate, insisting he is not qualified to contest the 2015 presidential election.
The PDP presidential campaign organization noted that the current shocking disclosures bring to the fore how and what qualifications were used to recruit him into the military, without a minimum school leaving certificate, where he rose to the rank of a General and even became the Head of state through a military coup that truncated a democratically-elected government in 1983.
Fani-Kayode stated, “Academic qualification is a threshold issue that cannot be waived for any citizen no matter how highly-placed and irrespective of whichever region such individual comes from except as provided by the constitution.
“Thus the question must be asked; is Buhari or any other citizen qualified to contest election into the office of the president without meeting the minimum constitutional requirement?
“A perusal of the Nigerian constitution at section 131 unequivocally states that; “A person shall be qualified for election to the office of President if: (a) He is a citizen of Nigeria by birth (b) He has attained the age of forty years(c) He is a member of a political party and is sponsored by that political party; and (d) He has been educated up to at least School certificate level or its equivalent.
“It is to be noted that section 131 (d) is a specific directional order for all candidates to show proof of education up to a minimum standard not below school certificate or its equivalent”.
He also posited that from what INEC has published, “Buhari has not submitted any personal particular of minimum school leaving certificate for the 2015 election and, shockingly, from INEC documents displayed in all constituencies, he also did not submit anything in 2011 and never referred the electoral umpire then to the Secretary of the Military Board as well as previous elections he contested as evidenced in all available INEC records until this current discovery.
“If the constitution did not require proof, it would not specify a minimum. To strengthen this claim the extant Electoral Act directs that such proof must be sworn to by each candidate at a Court under section 31 (2) to (5) viz (2)“The list of information submitted by each candidate shall be accompanied by an affidavit sworn to by the candidate at the Federal High Court, High Court of a state or the FCT, indicating that he has fulfilled all the constitutional requirements for election into that office” (3) “The Commission shall within 7 days of the receipt of the personal particular of the candidate,(emphasis here is personal particular and not INEC form given to fill nor court document like affidavit) and publish same in the constituency where the candidate intends to contest” (4) A person may apply to the Commission for a copy of nomination form, affidavit and any other document submitted by a candidate at an election and the Commission shall, upon payment of a prescribed fee, issue the person with a certified copy of the documents within 14 days” (5) “Any person who has reasonable grounds to believe that any information given in the affidavit or any document submitted by that candidate is false may file a suit at the Federal High Court, High Court of a state or FCT against such person seeking a declaration that the information contained in the affidavit is false” (6)” If the court determines that any of the information contained in the affidavit of any document submitted by that candidate is false, the court shall issue an order disqualifying the candidate from contesting the election.”
“Nigerians that have perused the affidavit of nomination as submitted by General Buhari and as published in all INEC offices, as well as the copies of his similar INEC documentations for 2011 election, could see clearly that General Buhari who claims to be a man of integrity has not been true to Nigerians. It can be seen, as indicated in section 31(6), that there are reasonable grounds to believe that a false deponent was declared in the affidavit where it indicates that all documents relating to the personal particulars of General Buhari are with the Secretary of the Military Board.
“First in the INEC Form CF 001 for 2015 filled by General Buhari at section C of the form, the instruction on the form clearly states “Attach evidence of all educational qualifications” – THIS WAS NOT DONE.
“Yet an affidavit was sworn otherwise. Curiously, he did not refer INEC to this board in 2011 in his records available for anyone who cares to see how Buhari has, in breach of the constitution of 1999, contested elections without meeting the mandatory constitutional requirement and has been treated preferentially”.
Consequent upon the above, Fani-Kayode wondered if Buhari is above the law of the Land, insisting that “INEC erred in law by publishing the name of a candidate without receiving the personal particulars of the candidate within 7 days of receiving his nomination forms as indicated in section 31(3).
“The Nigerian constitution has now been finally rubbished and no longer respected. What is even more tragic is the fact that one or two otherwise respected Yoruba political elites are the ones in the vanguard of the promotion and defence of Buhari in this rape of the Nigerian Constitution.
“Our Conclusion: BUHARI, FROM THE ABOVE, IS NOT QUALIFIED TO CONTEST THE 2015 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION”.
The allegation of certificate scandal has been on the front burner in the past couple of weeks now.
