APGA presidential candidate advocates shifting 2023 elections by two weeks

By Cyril Mbah, Abuja

The Presidential Candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) in the 2023 general elections, Chekwas Okorie has advocated the shifting of the elections by two weeks to enable the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to prepare well for the polls. 

Okorie suggested the postponement starts with the presidential polls, to avoid looming failure.

The APGA candidate based his appeal on complaints by the INEC National Chairman, Mahmood Yakubu, of petrol and cash scarcity that has slowed down the mobilization processes of the electoral commission.

Okorie who had become party flag-bearer after emerging victorious in the protracted litigation with party contender, Phillip Umeadi at the Supreme Court, said the INEC and security agencies needed at least two to three weeks or more time to ensure proper preparation for the polls.

He stated that it will be counter-productive for INEC to rush into a national election without adequate preparations based on evidence and in a bid to make an impression about timeliness, consistency and honesty, does not achieve the goal of having a free, fair and credible election.

Okorie argued that the electoral umpire requires sufficient funds to pay for several logistics, and an adequate supply of fuel to power the vehicles that would transport sensitive and non-sensitive electoral materials to the 774 local government areas and wards throughout the 36 states of the federation and Abuja.

He warned that the cash crunch and fuel scarcity across the nation may have prompted the INEC chairman to recently raise an alarm on the matter.

“Let our policy planners sit down with INEC and other stakeholders and see how the elections can be shifted by about two or three weeks so that it can start in March or thereafter to enable the electoral body to prepare well.”

“I am worried that INEC has raised the red flag about the absence of some of the things it requires for the election. I am also worried about the slow response of the Federal Government to these complaints,” he added.

“An election of a national dimension is not a child’s play. We need fuel to transport sensitive and non-sensitive materials across the local governments and wards in the 36 states of the federation, since [the] INEC may not have the capacity to move the materials on its own. It requires money to hire transporters to do the job.”

Okorie maintained that INEC stood a better chance if it shifted election dates by some weeks and performed the actions right and get better results, instead of rushing to give the impression that it met a timeline. 

“Many of the political parties are thinking along this line and it would be to the credit of INEC and the Federal Government by extension to get the process right than to rush and make a mess of the entire situation,” the APGA presidential candidate

Okorie also complained about the slow process of substituting the name of the former APGA presidential candidate with the name of the new candidate as prescribed by the court ruling on the matter. 

He said that the delay points to extraneous influences and a design to undermine the democratic process and deny APGA supporters their rightful place in the general elections.