Over 1,000 lawyers under the aegis of the Association of Legislative Drafting and Advocacy Practitioners (ALDRAP) have called disqualification of Joash Amupitan as the chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
The lawyers who are also staff and consultants of the National Assembly warned that Amupitan’s involvement with the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the last election creates room for bias and conflict of interest which in turn violates Section 5 of the Code of Conduct Bureau and Tribunal Act and Section 19 of the ICPC Act.
In a letter addressed to the Senate President through the Committee on Electoral Matters, the group of lawyers said their goal is to promote professionalism in the enactment of the laws of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
According to the group, this can only be achieved through public legal education programmes, and public interest litigation.
The lawyers said it further deemed it fit to notify the Nigerian Senate of President Bola Tinubu’s expected plan to seek the confirmation of Amupitan as the new INEC chairman.
According to the group, it is pertinent to note that Amupitan does not meet the qualifications required to assume the position of the chairman of the electoral empire in the first instance.
It called on the National Assembly to, as a matter of urgency, dispatch the president’s letter without taking the next step of referring the said letter to the Committee on Electoral Matters.
“The reason is because Prof. Joash Amupitan as a former Legal Counsel to the All Progressives Congress-APC at the 2023 Presidential Electoral Petition at the Supreme Court of Nigeria is automatically disqualified from holding the position of Chairman of INEC.
“Previous Precedent of Senate’s disqualification of INEC Nominees such as Lauretta Onochie in the year 2021 due to their affiliation to the All Progressives Congress-APC to be disqualified from confirmation by your respected Committee,” ALDRAP said in the letter.
It also stated that the confirmation of Amiputan as the substantive chairman of INEC would be evidence that he is using his previous position as lead Legal Counsel to the APC to benefit himself and confer advantage upon himself.
“There are over 200,000 lawyers in Nigeria, if the President and the National Council of State have decided that the next Chairman of INEC ought to be selected from the legal profession, then there are not less than 100,000 Nigerian lawyers who are not registered members of any political party or previously acted as legal counsel to any political party in Nigeria. His Excellency President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria can select from this category of lawyers to avoid the appearance of bias,” the letter added.
ALDRAP went further to state that, should the Senate go ahead to confirm Amupitan’s nomination as INEC chairman, the association would be left with no other option than to initiate a legal action against the Red Chamber.
The article was originally published on Politics Nigeria.
