June 09, (THEWILL)- The President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan, on Wednesday, asked the Committee on the Independent National Electoral Commission to screen for confirmation, Muhammadu Buhari’s controversial aide, Ms. Lauretta Onochie, as part of six nominations for INEC commissioners.
Civil society groups had last year maintained that Onochie’s appointment violated Paragraph 14, Part 1 of the Third Schedule to the Constitution as amended by Section 30, Act No 1 of 2010, which states that a member of the INEC “shall be non-partisan.”
Other names on the list are, Prof. Muhammad Kallah (Katsina); Prof. Kunle Ajayi (Ekiti); Saidu Ahmad (Jigawa); Prof Sani Adam (North- Central); and Dr Baba Bila (North-East).
The development came eight months after Buhari sent the list of the nominees to the Senate for screening.
The Senate INEC panel, which has Senator Kabiru Gaya as Chairman, has four weeks to conclude the screening and report back to the red chamber at plenary.
The nomination of Onochie, the President’s Personal Assistant on Social Media, as a National Commissioner of the INEC, had been greeted with criticisms.
A protests among the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) members in the Red Chamber had halted the process of the screening.
They faulted the idea of making Onochie, a card-carrying member of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as an INEC Commissioner to represent Delta State on the board of the commission.
