Senate Shelves Electoral Bill Consideration

The consideration of the Electoral Act (Amendment) Bill, 2018 for third reading and passage, which was earlier scheduled on the Order Paper of Thursday, was stood down by the Senate so as to enable the Senate Committee on Independent National Electoral Commission to carry out further legislative work on the bill.

The Leader of the Senate, Senator Ahmad Lawan, explained that the decision was to allow the Committee more time.

“In view of the sensitive nature of the bill and its importance, it was vital to give the Committee more time to do a thorough job,” Lawan said.

In his remarks, the Senate President, Senator Abubakar Bukola Saraki, corroborated Lawan’s position.

Saraki promptly put it to voice vote, and it was unanimously adopted.

The bill had scaled second reading on October 10, a day, after the two chambers of the National Assembly resumed from its eleven-week annual recess.

The bill has been very contentious as President Muhammadu Buhari had declined assent to the bill for three consecutive times.

This is, therefore, the fourth attempt by the lawmakers to have the bill passed and assented into law.

The Senior Special Assistant to the President on National Assembly Matters (Senate), Senator Ita Enang, while giving clarification in Abuja on the action of the President, said that Buhari declined assent to the bill due to some drafting issues and the period fixed for primaries among others.

He gave the clarification following a report published by a national daily, hinting that Buhari had again vetoed the bill forwarded to him for assent.

Enang said that the vetoed bill was the one sent to the President on June 27 and not the one passed by both chambers of the National Assembly on July 24, the day the lawmakers embarked on annual recess.

Journalists had reported that besides the vetoed version of the 2018 Electoral Bill, forwarded to the President on June 27 and vetoed on July 26 in line with the 30 days constitutional life line for such bill, the President had earlier in the year, rejected the first version of the 2010 Electoral Act (Amendment) Bill 2018 forwarded to him in February for assent.