Senate says electoral violence worse today than ever

 

• Fears Senators may be consumed in violence

 

The Senate has expressed deep-seated fear at the worsening incidences of electoral violence that have continued to characterise elections in Nigeria.

And in other to curb this malaise, Leader of the Senate, Yahaya Abdullahi, has hinted that the upper chamber of the National Assembly might have to come up with a bill that will prescribe punishments for perpetrators of violence during elections.

“It is important if the Minority Leader and I can come up with a by-partisan bill to look at the punishments for electoral violence.

“Let us see how we can raise a law to effectively tackle electoral violence because electoral violence knows no partisanship. All politicians on all sides are guilty,” Senator Abdullahi proposed.

He added: “Electoral violence started from the beginning of our democratic journey in 1999, but it’s getting worse by the day.

“There were pockets of violence in other republics, but they were not as terrible as what we have today.

“If we don’t curb this phenomenon, it’s going to be dangerous for our country.”

THE PUNCH reports that Abdullahi stated this on Tuesday while contributing to a motion moved by Senator George Sekibo, on the violence that rocked the governorship elections in Bayelsa and Kogi states on November 16.

He warned that any politician, irrespective of his or her political parties, could be a victim of violence during elections.

The Senate Majority Leader spoke just as the United Nations condemned the killings during the governorship election in Kogi State.

Also, on Tuesday, the House of Representatives said it would investigate the violence during the governorship elections in Kogi and Bayelsa states.

How APC thugs burnt my wife to death – Husband of Kogi PDP Woman Leader

No fewer than six people were killed during the governorship election in Kogi State. On November 18, a People’s Democratic Party woman leader, Salome Abuh, was burnt to death when thugs set her home at Ochadamu in the Ofu Local Area of the state on fire.

At the Senate plenary on Tuesday, Abdullahi said there was the need for the two main political parties in the Senate to work together and save the nation’s electoral process.

He said, “The spectre of violence and its attendant consequences are some of the unhealthiest events in the country. I believe that all politicians, irrespective of the various parties we belong to, have a responsibility to address and to curb violence, otherwise we will all become victims.

“So, there is the need for us to urge the security agencies to really do their jobs. They should arrest and bring to book the perpetrators of the dastardly act, who are known.”

The Minority Leader, Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe, lamented that the security agencies had not successfully prosecuted the perpetrators of electoral violence.

He said, “People have been known and seen to perpetuate violence and nothing has been done to them. Once nothing is done to somebody, once nobody pays the price for criminality of this nature, it only creates further violence.

“The law enforcement agencies must be up to the task. The husband of the woman that was killed in Kogi State has identified those who killed his wife but till today, nothing has been done to them.

“We have heard all manner of excuses and there is now a pattern. If you don’t curb it through the use of enforcement, you will only see that pattern continue to grow.”

The Senate consequently, condemned the spate of election-related violence in the country and also observed a minute silence in honour of all those who lost their lives in the violence during the governorship polls in Bayelsa and Kogi states.

It urged the National Orientation Agency and the Independent National Electoral Commission, to carry out a detailed campaign against electoral violence in subsequent elections.