2023 Polls: Appeal Court President Urges INEC To Sanction Electoral Offenders

President of the Court of Appeal (PCA), Justice Monica Dongban-Mensem, has urged the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to sanction electoral offenders and ensure that politicians and their supporters play by election rules.

Justice Dongban-Mensem averred that where INEC takes electoral crimes seriously and electoral criminals are thoroughly prosecuted, the electoral process would become better.

The PCA, who urged politicians to explore alternative dispute resolution mechanisms, called for enhanced enlightenment for the electorate to make informed choices during elections.

“The electorate should come together, talk and agree to defend their votes. And they defend their votes by demanding of politicians to tell them (electorate) what it is they are coming to do for them. If politicians fail to do it, the voters have the right to vote them out… Let the people know that they have the power to remove people who do not keep to their promises.

“I think electoral education is very important… Traditional rulers and local leaders should also educate the electorate and appeal to the consciences of the politicians.

“They should be encouraged to look more to that internal mechanism of resolving differences than rushing to court,” she said.

Justice Dongban-Mensem expressed the hope that politicians would explore the use Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) and submit their cases to the Court of Appeal Mediation Centre so that the bulk of the work in courts can be reduced.

The PCA, who spoke in her office in Abuja while hosting a delegation from the European Union (EU) Office in Nigeria, said the people should be enlightened to have the encourage to elect their leaders themselves by defending their votes and to use the media as an investigative tool to expose electoral schemes and culprits.

She also stressed the need for judges to be trained on what to look out for, especially with the emergence of the new Electoral Act, that could be of concern in relation to other existing laws.

Justice Dongban-Mensem, who expressed her confidence in democracy, asserted that if the democratic process was fair, it would engender rapid development of the country, more than any other form of government.

She hailed the EU team for its interest in Nigeria’s electoral process and the 2023 general election.

The leader of the delegation, Laolu Olawumi, who is also the Head of Section, Governance, Peace and Migration, noted that “the Nigerian political process is moving more and more away from the system where people go to a polling unit and the polling unit decides who becomes the newly elected President.”

He added: “We are moving to a situation where you have cases and elections being determined or ending up at the tribunals and the increasing cases of conflicting judgments and issues with practice directions.

“These are important issues we cannot shy away from and must be collectively addressed.”

Olawumi said it is always critical for the EU to engage the Judiciary, especially the Court of Appeal, adding that the meeting was a follow-up of the EU’s courtesy visit to the Court of Appeal earlier this month.

He said the aim of the EU is to better understand what the issues are and to understand what the court thinks should be done and how it can come in.