NCFront Hails US Visa Ban on Nigeria’s Election
Riggers.
Pan Nigerian political movement, the National Consultative
Front(NCFront) has thrown its weight behind the decision of the
United States to place visa ban on election riggers in Nigeria.
Addressing Journalists in Abuja on Tuesday the NCFront said the
move is clearly within the rights of the US government to slam such
restrictions on any politician whose conducts it believes is
inimical to the tenets of its kind of democratic principles.
The NCF backed the US action against Nigerian politicians at a
National Dialogue aimed at x-raying the “Crisis of Internal Party
Democracy in Nigeria: the effects, and panacea.
The political association said the US visa ban will help to
sanitize electoral processes in Nigeria and serve as deterant to
erring politicians in a culture of impunity.
Speaking on the burning issue, the Head Public Affairs Bureau,
Tanko Yunusa however said that the US government should have shared
the information; including the identity of the affected politicians
with credible organisations like his National Consultative
Front.
He argued that such unilateral decision by the United States has
the capacity of undermining Nigeria’s sovereignty.
The United States had on Monday announced the Visa ban on some
unidentified politicians over their conducts in the forthcoming Edo
and Ondo Governorship elections as well as the concluded elections
in Kogi and Bayelsa State.
On the problem of Internal Party democracy; NCFront lamented the
culture of impunity and absolute disregard for political party
constitutions especially as it relates to the conduct of primaries
and conventions.
The group called for an amendment of the Constitution that will fix
a time limit to when a politician can switch political allegiance
in an election year.
The NCF believed that a major cause of internal party crisis
lied in in a culture that allows money bags jump bait at the last
minute for their selfish political gains and at the expense of
other party members who have toiled for the party.
As a solution to the dwindling of internal party democracy in
Nigeria; the group called for the unbundling of the Independent
National Electoral Commission (INEC).
The group said INEC as it is currently constituted is
overburdened; stressing that splitting the responsibility of the
electoral body will create the necessary mechanisms and sufficient
time to address many of the internal crises tearing political
parties apart in the country.