 And welcome to CSIS. I really want to thank and welcome our Nigerian visitors today. And on behalf of the American people, I apologize for the polar vortex that we're experiencing right now. I know it's quite a shock. Before we begin, I would like to just pause a moment to remember our friend and colleague, Joel Barkin, who passed away earlier this month. Joel was a senior associate with the Africa program. He was a world-renowned scholar on African political development. He was generous, tireless, and a gregarious spirit who will be deeply missed by so many of us here. His specialty was East Africa, but he spent much of November traipsing around Nigeria with Peter Lewis and loving every moment of it. I really wish that he was here today. So this event marks the launch of the CSIS Nigeria election forum. A series of events that we will be holding over the course of the next 18 months in the run-up and aftermath of Nigeria's forthcoming national elections currently scheduled or just scheduled for February 14th, 2015. We're very grateful to the Ford Foundation for the generous support that has made the forum possible and to the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, CICE, Peter Lewis, and Paul Lubeck for partnering with us on this forum. Also, to the many colleagues in Nigeria watchers here in Washington who have been generous with their time and insights in helping us shape this series going forward as well. The list is long, but among them are Chris Fomunio from NDI, Sarah Prey at Open Society Foundations, Johnny Carson and John Temin at USIP, Deirdre Lapin, Gretchen Birkel at IRI. I think there are many more here, and if we haven't got to you yet, we will, certainly will in the course of the series. I'm looking at John Payden and John Campbell here in the front row. And so we hope that this will be actually a very collaborative effort here in Washington to help raise the profile of these elections. The forum is intended, again, to kind of showcase the importance of these upcoming elections and profile the perspectives of a diverse range of Nigerian opinion leaders, activists, political and party leaders, and government officials around the challenges that are facing us in the year ahead. We hope also to identify the priority steps in ensuring that the 2015 elections are free, fair, and credible in the eyes of the Nigerian people, and to better understand where U.S. assistance and diplomatic engagement, whether public or private, can be most effective and helpful. Elections obviously are not the be-all and end-all of the democratic process, but they are critically important moments for the political leaders to be held to account and for citizens to shape the country's future. But also, as competing visions of the future crystallize, elections can also be moments that lay bare and sometimes deepen existing fissures, political, regional, religious, ethnic, and so forth. And they too often serve as triggers of uncertainty, insecurity, and sometimes violence. In Nigeria, these forthcoming elections are critically important. Nigeria is in a period of political flux. Political alliances are shifting as fractures within the ruling PDP have opened. Opposition parties coming together to form a coalition, the all-progressive Congress. Elite consensus around the rules of succession is beginning to unravel. And the tensions that were manifest in the 2011 elections, which left 800 people dead in their aftermath, many are still unresolved. The possibilities of tax from the violent extremist group Boko Haram in the north or from militias in the country's oil-producing Niger Delta compound this challenge. So it's in this context of uncertainty and change that the quality, the integrity, and the credibility of the elections have profound implications and the potential of deepening divisions or beginning to bridge them. At this launch event, we have a really exceptional panel. Professor Atahiru Jega, chair of Nigeria's Independent National Election Commission. INIC has joined us and a stellar group of civil society leaders who are engaged in the electoral process and civic education and human rights and so forth. And after Professor Jega's remarks, we're going to turn to a panel. My colleague Richard Downey will chair. Before I briefly introduce Professor Jega, I wanted to turn to Hillary Pennington, whose vice president at Ford Foundation, just to say a few words. And again, we're really most grateful for Ford's support. Thanks, Jennifer, and good morning to all of you. I am here really representing innocent Chakuma, who leads our Nigerian West African office. But I'm very, very much looking forward to your discussions here. You know, just as Jennifer just said, I think if there is anything that observers and stakeholders inside and outside of Nigeria are in agreement about, about the forthcoming general elections, it is that they have the potential to define the stability and future direction of the country. Attention so far has focused on the challenges, especially the volatile security environment, deep-rooted ethnic and religious divisions in the Nigerian society, and the virulent rhetoric of leading political figures which feeds the tension. But for us at the Ford Foundation, the elections present a unique opportunity that has not always been there in the recent history of Nigeria. The possibility of having evenly and keenly contested elections between political parties of fairly equal standing, given the coming together of key opposition parties under one umbrella and the defection of key figures from the ruling party to the opposition. But this opportunity also presents a different kind of challenge that underscores the importance of this gathering today, which is that the outcome of the elections and its acceptability by all stakeholders will depend heavily on public perception of how effective, efficient, and in particular neutral the electoral administration and other critical players will be in performing their functions before, during, and after the election. And we are therefore happy that these series of convenings around the elections are kicking off with a conversation with the chairman of the Nigerian National Independent Electoral Commission, INEC, Professor Atahira Jega, and leading civil society actors in the country to get their perspectives on what is going on and what needs to be done. In supporting this convening and the others that will follow under the rubric of the Nigeria elections forums, our hope at the Ford Foundation in sponsoring them is really threefold. First, that stakeholders, particularly those from Nigeria, will take advantage of them to have candid discussions and come up with suggestions and plans for action that can help advance the conduct of peaceful and credible elections in 2015. Second, that U.S. policymakers and in particular the Africa policy community will be exposed to the major issues at play in the run-up to the elections, be sensitized about the critical importance of the elections to the West African region, and more importantly, pay closer attention to key developments in this complicated time in Nigeria. And finally, we hope that participants will have balanced, will get balanced information about political developments in Nigeria and can contribute to dispelling the gloom and doom that sometimes pervade discussions about Nigeria these days. So we want to thank CSIS for organizing this meeting and we look forward to a good discussion and continuing to partner with you going forward. Thank you. Thank you so much, Hillary. Now I will turn to Professor Jega, who is the chair. You have his biography in your handout, so I'm not going to go over that in detail, just to say that Professor Jega was appointed by President Goodluck Jonathan in 2010 and steered the country through the 2011 elections. Those elections were not without flaws, but in technical terms they were head and shoulders above the two preceding elections. And much of that is thanks to the leadership of Professor Jega, whose integrity and credibility, candor, openness to communication, and to criticism made that possible. Professor Jega's leadership showed that individuals can make a tremendous difference in shaping the credibility and restoring confidence in state institutions. He has a very tough road ahead, but he also has many supporters who are very eager to see this process succeed. So Professor Jega, I'll turn over to you. Welcome and the floor is yours. Distinguished ladies and gentlemen, good morning to you all. I'm delighted with this opportunity to participate in this event of the CSIS Nigeria Forum. And I thank CSIS Jennifer and all the wonderful people at CSIS for giving me this opportunity and some of us from Nigeria to share with you what we've been doing in order to keep on improving the integrity of the conduct of elections in our country. We did our best before the 2011 General Elections, and the little that we did raised expectations and also generated appreciation to the fact that compared to the previous elections, there has been value added and there have been useful reforms even though the elections were not perfect. Since the 2011 elections, we in the Independent National Electoral Commission preoccupied ourselves with the challenge of bringing additional reforms so that 2015 elections will be remarkably much, much better and so that we can lay the foundation of more sustainable, credible electoral processes in our country beyond 2015. Before I share with you some of the challenges, some of what we've been doing in preparing for the 2015 elections and some of the challenges we've been facing, I want by way of introduction just make a few remarks. First, I want to say that and I think virtually all of us in this room know that Nigeria is a country in transition to democracy that we are still nurturing a democratic political culture after many years of military rule and the anti-democratic tendencies which have been fostered in that period of military rule. Our electoral system is therefore work in progress. The main task is to implement reform measures aimed at incremental positive changes that are sustainable. Democratization in all societies is neither swift nor smooth sailing. It is a long and torturous process that takes place in incremental waves. Until 1999, Nigeria's experience with democratization was in fits and starts characterized by military interventions. The Fourth Republic, which is said to have commenced in 1999, has brought some stability to the democratization process. However, the process has been bedoubled by badly conducted elections that left many Nigerians frustrated and the questioning the value and validity of electoral democracy. That was the challenge facing our country when we came on board as a new electoral commission in June 2010. Soon thereafter, we conducted the 2011 elections that were adjudged locally and I think internationally among the best elections Nigeria has ever had. What did the commission do to raise the bar? Let me briefly highlight some of the things that we did before the 2015 general elections so that we can see also what we have done since the 2015 general elections. First of all, we believed that the credibility of the voter's register is very, very important to the credibility of the electoral process. So we committed ourselves to doing a biometric voter's register and we were able to do one. Since the 2011 elections, we've kept on improving the integrity of that register. We rushed the process of doing the register because we used a period of barely three weeks to register and capture biometric details of 73.5 million Nigerians. So there are many challenges in that registration. In fact, one of the key challenges was that because we finished the registration in February and we had to issue a register in accordance with the electoral act 30 days before the election, which was by 30th of May because the elections were scheduled for April, we had to rush the process. So we allowed, even though there should be no two registers for the election, we allowed what we called an addendum register leading to the 2011 elections. We used the electronic register where a substantial overwhelming majority of those registered were on that, but then we used what we call addendum register, which was a manual register that contained the details of all those who presented themselves at the registration venues and were registered and were issued what was called a temporary voters card, but who for technical reasons, either theft of equipment during registration, and there were many of equipment failure and loss of data, were not eventually on the electronic register. So we allowed that manual register, we called addendum register for the purposes of the general elections in 2011 and although we commenced consolidation and improving upon the register soon after the 2011 general elections, many of the governorship elections we did subsequently, we also had to allow the use of the addendum register. Subsequently, we took a decision that from the Annambara elections and to 2015 and beyond, there will no longer be the use of addendum register, that we would make sure that the biometric register created was optimized and that subsequent continuous voter registration processes will keep on improving the register. So we did a biometric registration, which we believe has been generally successful even though there are challenges, some of which we saw during the Annambara elections. Then we introduced what we called a remodified open ballot system. It was a balloting system that was tried in Nigeria before during the 1992 elections, but what we did in order to deal with some of the key challenges associated with elections in Nigeria, particularly fraud on election day, multiple voting, multiple registration, movement of people from one voting unit to another, we decided to have the process of accreditation and then the process of voting. Those who observed the election saw it. It was a cumbersome procedure, a lot of time wasted, but it helped us to deal with that major problem in Nigerian elections when politicians move people from one polling unit to the other on election day. Then thirdly, we improved election security as best as possible, particularly by improving some of the security features of sensitive electoral materials. These are standard things, normal things in many democracies, but which were lacking in our own context, but which we then ensured that were introduced. For example, serial numbering of ballot papers, color coding of the ballot papers, result sheets with security features, color coding or serial numbering of ballot boxes. All these we introduced which were lacking before. Then we also revised the framework for engaging ad hoc staff for election duties. In general, volunteers are used globally. In Nigeria, we had serious challenges about either using volunteers or using hired government public officials. Luckily for us, there is the National Youth Service Code Scheme in Nigeria where in any given year, there are no less than 350,000 young men and women who have graduated from tertiary institutions and who are doing Ewenya National Service. We entered into an agreement with the National Youth Service Scheme and we involved the NYSE members as ad hoc election duty staff with little compensation for their services. Those young men and women, as many observers of the 2011 general elections have noted, did their job with passion, with commitment and with integrity and it added a lot of value to the process. Then we also ensured that there is greater transparency in the framework for results coalition and the announcement of results. Here, we involved previously staff of INEC who are used as returning officers and when we came in as a new commission, there were allegations about how INEC staff sold results to the highest bidder and we felt that even if that was just a perception, we needed to do something to ensure that we deal with that perception and also prevent that possibility from occurring. We brought vice-chancellors of federal universities, even state universities to be returning officers for presidential and governorship elections and we involved professors and other senior lecturers as returning officers for the lower level elections, senatorial, House of Reps and so on. It went on very well and I think there is also a general appreciation of how the involvement of this category of Nigerians has added value and integrity to the electoral process. We also did a lot to bring more open and transparent procedures and modalities on election day. For example, something again that is given in many electoral jurisdictions but which was virtually absent in the Nigerian context was ensuring that results are pasted at the polling unit so that observers and citizens can see who won at any particular polling unit and we insisted and trained our staff to do that and for the first time it was done broadly and more generally. Even though I think at the end of it perhaps only about 70 to 80 polling units displayed the results during the presidential election but it was our substantial compliance and it was tremendous value added. We did quite a number of other things including the creation of what we called an interagency consultative committee on election security. Security challenges are enormous as we are all aware and leading to the 2011 elections we set up this committee that brought together all security heads of all security agencies all their representatives and it was co-chaired at the national level by the national security advisor and the chairman of INEC and it offered us an opportunity to discuss all matters relating to security for electoral purposes and also it helped us to build synergy and to smoothen interservice rivalries as they occur in the field with regards to election duty and it helped a lot really in terms of the preparations for the election. I think pre-election and election day violence was remarkably reduced even though there was subsequently the unfortunate incidence of post-election violence which also taught us a lot of lessons and we factored it into our appropriations for the 2015 general elections. So what lessons did we learn? I think in order to draw the appropriate lessons we did in-house reviews we also had security review by the interagency consultative committee on election security we also had external independent review by people drawn from the academia and the civil society organizations and then we also did a structural and organizational review getting notable management consulting firm to advise us about how can we trim INEC reorganize it, restructure it so that it can be a trim organization without overlaps of responsibilities so that we can bring additional efficiency and effectiveness into the work of the commission. So all these reviews brought out a number of lessons for us for preparing for 2015 and we've been busy trying to implement programs of activities leading to 2015 taking into account those lessons which we've learned. I can mention just a few of these. I think eventually my presentation will be circulated for people to see the details. For example, one major lesson we learned was that good elections require adequate and timely planning and we didn't have adequate time to plan before the 2011 elections and we realized that going to the 2015 elections we had to start planning soon after and we've been doing quite a lot of that. We also learned that good elections are about effective partnerships and cooperation because everybody has a role and a responsibility to play. Yes, the election management body has a role to conduct and manage elections efficiently, freely and fairly but the success of an election being free of fair also depends on how other actors and other stakeholders are involved in the process. Improving partnerships and strengthening relationships and cooperation was a big lesson and we've been busy trying to do that. Also, good elections are about openness. Little we've done to bring transparency to the process showed us how that is appreciated and they need to be more open and more transparent as we prepare for the 2015 elections. We also came away with the lesson that even though the election we conducted in 2011 was generally acclaimed as technically one of the best, if not the best elections conducted in Nigeria but we realized that we knew from all the reviews that it wasn't a perfect election. There were a lot of challenges and there is also tremendous scope for improvement as we move towards 2015 and we applied ourselves to doing that. So as we prepared for the 2015 general elections we identified what we call three focal points relating to structure, to policy and to plan. With regards to structure we've taken a long and deep look at INEC as an institution. Its structure and processes as well as its human resources. With regards to policy we have focused on developing new policies to guide our work and create the right normative framework for successful election management in Nigeria just in 2015 but beyond 2015. And with regards to planning we have focused on both strategic planning and election day planning which we believe are also very very important for success. In the last 18 months or so we've done quite a lot in regards to all these focal points which I have identified. Again my presentation has in detail itemized what we've done. I will just give a few examples. For example we did a strategic plan covering the period 2012 to 2016 and we've been busy implementing it. There are still challenges but I think we've come far and we believe that the way we've implemented it has added value which would impact the conduct of the elections in 2015. We also did a detailed what we call an election project plan which tells us what we needed to do leading to the 2015 election. And as I have mentioned earlier on did a comprehensive reorganization of structuring of the commission based on the report of the management consulting firm which we engaged. I would not also bother to mention the specific things which the restructuring was designed to achieve. I have itemized them here but I think what is most important is that it has helped us to do what I call putting square pegs in square hole within the context of the resources, human resources that INEC has. It has also helped us in terms of identifying training gaps and training needs and getting many of our development partners to assist in terms of bridging those identified gaps. And then of course we have done a lot of the consolidation and deed application of the biometric register even though as I mentioned we believe very strongly that in spite of what you often read in the press the register of voters we have in Nigeria can compare favorably with any similar register electronic biometric register on the African continent. We have no doubt about that. But it's not a perfect register, it's a work in progress. We are using AFIS to remove multiple registration and we've successfully removed multiple registration but we also know that the AFIS is not 100% optimal. It can remove but sometimes it's not 100%. But if you achieve 98%, it's good enough to keep on improving Apple. One area which was very challenging for us was the area of voter education and publicity. And we've done our best before 2011. We realize there is a lot more to be done in leading to 2015 and we have just approved what we call communication policy and strategy which gives us a good framework in terms of how to communicate more effectively leading to the 2015 general elections with identified roles and target groups and what strategies can be used to reach those target groups. So we are convinced that the prospects of having remarkably much better elections in 2015 are bright given what we've been able to do to reform and to improve the process since the 2011 elections things that we were not able to do before the 2011 elections and we believe that this should add tremendous value to making 2015 elections free, fair, peaceful and credible. But of course there are still a number of challenges outstanding. There is the challenge of insecurity which I think is generally known and some of these are systemic challenges. There is little if anything that an electoral commission can do about it but I can tell you that as far as we are concerned in INEC we are preparing in the belief that elections will take place everywhere all over the country in 2015. And our hope is that long before 2015 given the many efforts that are being made to bring peace whether it is with regards to the security agencies or with regards to dialogue and reaching out we hope that sufficient stability would be restored. In many of these areas where there is emergency for us to be able to do elections without any fear for the staff that we deploy on election duty or for the materials that we will deploy on election duty. We have to be incurable optimists to operate in the kind of atmosphere in which we operate and I think many Nigerians many Nigerians would want to see elections take place all over the country and so as I say we prepare in the belief that elections will take place all over the country. Funding is a challenge. In our country where money is involved everybody is suspect. So when we do election budget and we present it everybody thinks that they have padded up the budget even though we know that in comparative terms in Africa our election budget using the key indicator of measuring election budgets it is comparable to all budgets of elections in the African continent. Of course Nigeria has a disadvantage of size. We are huge, a very large country in terms of terrain population so it will require a lot of resources so it's a challenge trying to defend the budget for elections but still we feel confident that in 2011 whatever we requested was provided and the legal framework is such that that once our budget is appropriated by the National Assembly it is released by the executive. So there is relative financial autonomy in that regard and I think perhaps we enjoy better relative autonomy than any other previous commission with regards to funding but of course we know again in our own country where budgeting is circumscribed by macroeconomic crisis and fluctuations what you want or need is not actually what you always get so there is always that apprehension as to whether we will get the resources that we need but again judging by what happened in 2011 and the need to do even better we think that what we need would be provided but one major area of course of challenge is the attitude of the political class. We've done our best to remove impunity in the process to minimize if not eliminate interference but again there are areas that are exclusive jurisdictions of political parties and candidates by law and there is very little we can do in that regard and looking at those areas there is a lot of cause for concern for example we are still there is still much to be desired with regards to civility in the conduct of politicking by our politicians you know sometimes statements made by politicians or candidates are not really state money or state mine is that the word? or state mineship whatever and the utterances you know tend to overheat the atmosphere and to generate conflict rather than create a framework for stability and so on so this is a very serious matter of concern and we also know that the mindset with which politicians come into the political arena is what in Nigeria is called the do or die mentality winning by hook or by crook we've succeeded in moderating that we've got all the political parties to commit themselves to a code of conduct we did that before the 2007 elections we've done that now long before the 2011 elections but you know a code of conduct is a freely signed agreement there are little if any sanctions it's all a matter of trust and the disposition and the attitude of the politicians who have signed this code of conduct so our hope is to work together with many civil society non-governmental organizations to keep on pushing for the need for political parties to respect the code of conduct bringing civility into discourse, political discourses to focus on manifestos and agenda and programs rather than personality and insults and those kinds of things the other challenge is that we also have in general an apathetic and indifferent citizenry very inactive to look at the statistics of participation in 2011 I think the highest percentage was regards to the presidential election and it was barely 57% or there about in anambara election which we did recently participation rate was 26% or there about although if you compare it with participation rate in the previous elections the last governorship the previous governorship election in anambara state for example had barely 17% participation level the one we conducted recently had 26% but there is still a lot of talk about disenfranchisement that we have disenfranchised people and so on and really the whole talk about disenfranchisement was media hype by those who lost the election in anambara state and who wanted to capitalize on the few mistakes that have been made in order to have the entire results cancelled all talk about disenfranchisement was about people who were on the addendum register and whom we said will not vote in the election whom we gave an opportunity as far back as August to use the continuous registration platform to have their details recaptured onto the electronic register and we did our best with limitations of resources to do voter education to get people to come out and so on we even did a display of the register and required all those who did not see their names on the displayed register to know that they need to use the opportunity of the CVR so that their details will be recaptured evidently many people did not use that opportunity and of course since we didn't use the addendum registers if you came to a polling unit and your name is not on the register then you are not allowed to vote and because many of these people had the temporary voters card issued in 2011 then what you see is they flashed the card we have the card yet our name is not in the register and a lot of media hype was done again one weakness of our communication strategy was that we did not respond efficiently and quickly until the damage was done and it's a big lesson we've learned from Anambra moving forward and then of course there are many people who did multiple registration and whose names have been removed from the register our business rule was that if a person does more than one registration we eliminate the last registration that has been done no we eliminate the previous registrations and leave the last registration that has been done so if somebody registered in a particular place initially and went and registered again and by our business rule we removed him from the first place where he has registered and during election now he comes to that place of course he would not see his name on the register now the lesson we've learned from Anambra is that as we move towards 2015 in all of these elections we are going to do in Akiti and in Oshun state this year we intend to also publish the names of those who have done multiple registration if you come to a polling unit your name is not on the register it's because you've done multiple registration and this is where your name is it's like bending over backwards to accommodate people who have committed offenses but at least it will minimize all this hype about disenfranchising people another challenge is with regards to the amendment to the legal framework the electoral act 2010 is very good much much better than previous legal framework for the election but from our experience in 2011 there are still areas that need to be reviewed and we've made submissions to the national assembly we are concerned that it has taken this long but towards the end of December we had a meeting with the senate committee on electoral matters and we've received assurances that before June the electoral legal framework would be improved upon and we hope and pray that that happens because certainly then it will give us a better legal framework much more improved legal framework for the conduct of elections we are not hopeful that constitutional amendment may come through before that period because there are certain recommendations that we made also to constitutional amendments which have bearing on the electoral legal framework but if all we can get is a review of the electoral act I think it will add substantial value in terms of the integrity of the legal framework before the 2015 elections we've drawn the attention of the legislators that Nigeria is a signatory to many international protocols that advised that legal reforms should not come into effect earlier than 60 days before an election ECHO has protocol, AU protocol, Commonwealth protocol so we hope that will really catalyze or hasten the process of the review well before June now we committed ourselves to reviewing electoral constituencies and to creating new polling units we've commenced the process we had an elaborate program regrettably as we all know reviewing constituencies is a very controversial political matter and the signals we've been getting we ourselves particularly because of in adequacy and inaccuracy of data particularly the population data to be able to because population criteria is major in our context even though there are other variables for that but the signals we are getting is that really to achieve a comprehensive constituency delimitation would be virtually impossible between now and the 2015 elections so we are scaling down our priority we are doing a lot with regards to mapping existing constituencies because there are even no maps for existing constituencies using satellite imagery and GIS and other ICT resources so we are doing a lot with regards to that so here this is one key thing that we have wanted to do before the 2015 general elections which we are unlikely to do to successfully have new constituencies delimited past with a resolution of the national assembly because it's a requirement in some jurisdictions once the Electoral Commission redraws boundaries they don't need or require a passage by the legislature in some jurisdictions you submit to the legislature but there is a time frame they do not pass it into loading it becomes effective but in our jurisdiction that is a requirement there has to be a resolution of the two houses before new constituencies come into effect but what we hope to achieve at the minimum is the creation of additional polling units right now many of our polling units are so large and therefore very difficult to manage and we are aiming at a minimum of 500 registered voters per constituency and if we are able to do that it will also bring the operational election day activities to reasonably acceptable international standards then prosecution of electoral offenders has been a major challenge for us we've made commitments the law says that INEC has the responsibility to prosecute electoral offenders not the police but INEC but in prosecuting we have to rely on police investigation reports and we have to rely on the courts and their traditional ways of operating so there is a lot we can do we are committed to continue to prosecute electoral offenders leading to the 2015 election we are forging partnerships particularly with the Bar Association we have so far prosecuted only about 200 which is a record because where we came from there was no record of successful prosecution but it's a drop in the ocean as I often say given the number of electoral offenders so there are a lot of things that we've done that gives us optimism that 2015 will be much much better than 2011 of course there are still a lot of skeptics out there we still make mistakes which then give people grounds to further reject the notion that we have the competence and the capacity to do better in 2015 but we remain focused, we remain determined and we continue to do our best as we move towards 2015 so the assurance I will give you here is that from an assessment of our preparations 2015 general elections will be much much better than 2011 we will continue to raise the bar substantially from where we left it in 2011 and given what I said in my opening remarks increased sustained reform efforts and actions are really what will lead us to democratic consolidation deepening democracy in our country and ensuring a robust and sustainable electoral framework but I must say that while we do all we've been doing we also know that our own effort enough is not enough all stakeholders have a role to play and when you hear people speak in the media or some politicians speak it is as if it is only INEC that can make elections in 2015 free fair and credible everybody has a role the politicians, the parties society organizations the different stakeholders and we are doing our best to sensitize all stakeholders to this and to get everybody and to put all hands on deck for that and we believe that in 2015 God willing Nigeria will take its rightful place in the global committee of nations where electoral democracy is being consolidated thank you very much thank you so much Professor Jega and for the audience here we will post those remarks on our website to go along with the webcast here so you can look at the finer details although that was a very rich and detailed description of all that INEC has been doing in the interest of time I'm going to just take a few questions I'll take them together and we'll turn back to Professor Jega this may mean that our following panel over a little bit I hope you can bear with us in that but let's take some questions gentlemen there and then we'll come over here thank you thank you Professor Jega for your brilliant presentation here my name is Samuel Okimban I'm the Executive Director of the Nigerian American Leadership Council located right here in Washington D.C. and that's a policy advisory institution for United States Government regarding Nigeria, American matters and Nigerian matters we like to pride ourselves in trying to offer solutions and not just criticizing from the bench and so as much as your presentation has captured some of the questions that we had today I would like to also provide an advisory that perhaps INEC needs to install security cameras within the polling centers especially while the results are being collated because we all know that just this potential that's always out there for INEC staff or anybody else to try to compromise the votes after they're already cast thank you we're going to have to keep the questions fairly short I'm afraid and also we don't know if there's a policy that ensures that INEC staff that handle sensitive materials sign an asset disclosure form and also an asset disclosure form that could be revisited five years after the election that way if there's any kind of compromise that has happened it can be captured during the prosecution thank you thank you yes on the left our old intern Hi Jennifer Professor Jegaf thank you for the great presentation you mentioned briefly during your talk that you reached out to the national service for them to volunteer I would like to know what art is being done to make sure that young people are fully participating in the electoral system thank you thank you and then one over here over on the far left Hi Professor Jegaf thanks for your presentation you mentioned briefly about the media I'm wondering what is INEC doing with regards to Nigeria media if you look at the last election in Ghana their media played critical role in helping to quiet things down you know they were calling out politicians that were making inflammatory remarks so it was quite remarkable I saw I was watching live on Joy FM so I'm thinking if Ghana could play that role can Nigeria media do the same and what role does INEC play in training Nigeria media that they have a critical role to play in this year's election thank you thank you very much these are great questions and may actually be subject of future forums and we've been thinking of having one particularly on that on the role of the media yes Ambassador microphone's coming hello Chairman Jegaf it's good to see you I wanted to ask about the reports about the timetable of the election being moved up to the end of 2014 and whether or not also the timetable of the governorship would be after the presidency and if any of that is true then would like to have your comment as to what the thinking is to do that thank you very much these are very good and interesting questions well in 20 with regards to security cameras and improving security in the polling units in 2011 we on an experimental basis bought some recording devices cameras that could be used for that purpose but really the bottom line is that these are cost elements in the election budget you know and there are areas in Nigeria if you have to deploy a camera video camera in every polling unit it's going to be very costly but what we have succeeded in doing in all the elections we've conducted so far is to ensure that coalition centers where results of the elections are collated are video recorded whether they are at the local government level or at the state level or at the presidential coalition center but to take that down to the polling units it's a huge cost element that we can't afford in the budget but these are areas that perhaps support can come for now do staff sign asset disclosure forms no I don't know but in the sense that all materials distributed on paper trail who gives them out who collected them in what quantities and that paper trail is there and it can be reviewed so really there is documentation in that regard although I do not understand so to this extent yes but I don't know whether you have some suggestions specifically about how this can be done better now national assembly is being done about young people's participation obviously we in INEC have recognized very good and important role that young people can play in the electoral process and in some of our partnerships with civil society organizations we seek to explore those areas and to sensitize and to involve young people one of that the partnerships we've had which has been very very useful is with regards to the use of social media both by NGOs run and managed by young people as well as targeting young people and as I speak with you in addition to our normal public relations department we have created what we call citizens information center citizens communications center we call it ICC ICCC you know and it's been very useful we use multimedia resources to provide information on a daily basis to all those who have inquired for information or clarification and so on this is in addition to our website which we keep on trying to improve so we recognize the very important role of young people I don't think there are specific efforts at legislation that seeks to draw the potential of young people but there are some lawyers here who are paying more attention to those issues than myself who comment now Nigeria media compared to Ghanaia media and the positive roles they play I think you are right unfortunately in Nigeria I mean there are many good people out there in the media who are doing their job credibly or creditably but the tendency has been negative and the tendency has been that of the use either skillful or crude use of the media by political interests to get what they want the news that they favor them rather than the truth and the facts of the case and what we saw in Anambra is one of those clear illustrations of the ways in which political interests use the media to shape public opinion contrary to the facts on the ground as I have said yes mistakes were made serious terrible mistakes by say our official the electoral officer in one of the 21 local governments messed up I have said it the distribution of result sheets we made sure in the past result sheets were just a performer form which you can take a result sheet you can go and take it to Anambra or take it to Sokoto and use it and we customized result sheets such that a result sheet is always specific to a polling unit so attention has to be paid to the distribution if you make a wrong distribution then it takes time and energy and effort to retrieve and to redistribute people and they knew this and unfortunately in one of the 21 local governments the distribution was messed up there was no credible explanation as to why that happened which was why we have commenced prosecution of the officer involved and that happened in one local government unfortunately politicians used that local government to make nonsense of the entire elections and 20 other local governments and wanted the results to be canceled because of that and the Nigerian media got on regrettably and again it's not their fault maybe it's also the fault of our own communication strategies as I said we were slow in responding and we've learned the bitter lesson from that as we move towards 2015 but you are right there is a lot that the media can do positively and we are increasing our engagement with editors and political correspondents many development partners are also doing workshops and training programs to get them to play a more positive role as we move towards 2015 so we'll continue to do our best under those circumstances but the media needs to have an enlightened public interest rather than be driven by the particularistic interests of politicians and we see a lot of that unfortunately then just quickly on the timing we issued a timetable for the elections this weekend this past weekend we had a retreat in Kaduna where we met with all the key staff of INEC national commissioners resident electoral commissioners directors and reviewed our preparations towards the 2015 election and we've now issued the timetable both for the governorship elections in Ekiti and Oshoom as well as for the general elections the law permits INEC to issue the timetable and the sequence of the elections and what we have done is to decide now instead of the three elections that we conducted in 2011 we will now conduct two elections in 2015 and we've decided to do all the national elections on one day and then to do all the local state elections on another day and we have also fixed the dates early in the timetable the earliest time permissible by law for example the national elections by law are to be conducted no later no later the lawyers have this phraseology that I don't understand it's no later than 150 days and no earlier no earlier than 150 days and no later than 30 days before the election and what we have done is to say okay let's do it early enough so that we will allow a bit more time for litigation hoping that a lot of the cases would be resolved before the handover date so we fixed the election now in February and the presidential elections together with the national assembly elections which is presidential, senatorial and house elections will take place on 14th of February which I've just been told is Valentine's Day or something that's the first thing that came to my mind but perhaps that's good and then the governorship and the state house of assembly elections on the 28th of February so I've been reading the media in the last two days and it's very interesting there are some who think it's good it's not good enough and people are saying we should have done all the elections on one day and there is something perhaps that we can aspire to but when the logistic challenges are so enormous that for now given the infrastructure existing infrastructure we better minimize the challenges and facing the elections is probably better and I share an anecdote I was in a conference with Ahmed Hassan the chairman of the Kenyan electoral commission sometimes last year and after he made a very beautiful presentation he was asked if there is anything that you did in this election that given the opportunity you will not do again what will it be and he said conducting all the elections on one day so I quickly called him and said you need to come to Nigeria and tell Nigeria that's why frankly it will be very very challenging for now for us to do all the elections on one day but what we are trying to do is to keep on trying and improving as I said incremental positive changes which are sustainable and that's what we are working towards Professor Jigga thank you so much for that and for the opportunities that we can't take more questions we are going to turn quickly to the next panel if everyone could just stay in their seats and the panel will come up again everyone here I think wants you to succeed and I think are willing to do what they can from here to help that happen so thanks very much and please join me good morning everyone we are here with the Africa program here and for the second part of our event this morning we are delighted to be joined by a group of prominent Nigerian civil society leaders who have been working collectively for some time on strategies to improve the conduct of Nigeria's election planning and execution they are here in Washington not only to talk to you this morning but also to meet policy makers from across the US I'm sure that next February's elections are on the radar of policy makers here and that advance planning is well underway one lesson that we learned from the 2011 elections was that civil society has a critical role to play in the run up to during and beyond the days of the polling itself in encouraging public participation in civic education in holding political candidates and parties to standards to conduct and being a calming influence and in monitoring of course the polling itself now that role looks from our standpoint here looking ahead to next year to be even more important in 2015 given the current political flux and the security environment in parts of the country on our panel this morning we have the heads of some of the most influential civil society groups in Nigeria coincidentally a triumvirate of lawyers on the platform this morning that wasn't deliberate but you have their bios in front of you I won't waste time going into all the details but just very briefly Nwankwo my immediate right is the executive director of policy and legal advocacy center he also hosts and leads the civil society Nigeria election situation room that's a platform for all the various civil society organizations working on electoral observation next to him Aisha Sorry is CEO of the Nigerian women's trust fund which is a non-profit organization working to increase the quality and quantity of women in government and then to my far right is Festa Sokoy who's a barrister solicitor of the Supreme Court of Nigeria also executive director of the NGO Human Rights Monitor and also the national coordinator of the independent election monitoring group along with various other titles and accolades as well our three panelists are only half of the delegation we have with us here this week the others we just don't have a platform big enough here for all of them but the others perhaps they can stand up and just say hello to the audience as well we have Abiola Akiode Apalabi Sorry I'm mangling names already who's executive director of women advocates research and documentation center Ine Mo Samyama is the country director of the stakeholders democracy network which works in the Niger Delta and then Jude Ohanele who's president of the southeast governance network which is a coalition of civil society organizations in the southeast region of Nigeria it's the Q&A I'd like to bring them in as much as possible and include them in the conversation as well but first I'd like to turn to Clement to make a few opening remarks we'll have very brief remarks as well from Aisha and Festus and then we'll reserve the rest of the time for your questions and answers Clement Thank you very much Richard first of all to Tang CSIS for organizing this it's really for us quite encouraging to see the Niger elections beginning to take center stage in policy centers such as Washington DC as well for foundation for supporting this we really the chairman of INEC has spoken this morning and he gives us a lot of encouragement looking towards 2015 and only a few days ago announced dates for the 2015 general elections the first being February 14 next year he says he doesn't know why it was fixed for February 14 certainly given the tension given the pressures given the talk about violence fixing it on a day that has its own significance for love and peace perhaps means that that's the expectation we all have towards 2015 but certainly the elections in 2015 will represent a milestone for Nigeria's political and democratic development where it will go very successful and we hope it does go very successful we in the civil society groups have continued to work in support of INEC not just because INEC is headed by one of our own but because all of our work has really focused on helping to entrench the development of democracy in Nigeria civil society are organized around a lot of fora the civil side election situation is one of such which brings together several Nigerian organizations working in different areas different focuses to try to achieve cohesion in terms of our interventions with elections and we have had several of such interventions engagement with INEC engagement with the security services engagement with the actors of state engagement with the political parties to provide an unbiased intervention and coordination with these different stakeholders in the election process and like I said civil society groups continue to give support to INEC in what it does and we recommend the chairman of INEC for his openness this was made I think Jennifer in her opening remarks did make those comments openness but also willingness to take criticisms and we've had quite a lot of criticisms for INEC the last local council the last local governorship elections in Anambra that the chairman repeatedly mentioned was one of such important occasions for us to have our own criticisms of the challenges that INEC has not really addressed the way we would like it to address it and the chairman has mentioned several issues increasingly of course INEC is showing the potential and perhaps even likelihood of being able to address these issues and the last governorship elections which is only two months away two months ago there were criticisms of INEC logistics preparations we did criticize the voters register it continues to be a cause for concern for us because of the various observations various complaints about the adequacy of the voters register we do know that INEC is doing a lot to try to bring it in conformity with acceptable standards and reduce the complaints and we hope that looking towards 2015 that INEC would as the chairman has stated address this problem because it would be a major concern if this problem was to remain in the 2015 general elections and we know that there are local governorship elections coming up in June this year in Akiti and following that ocean state would be following those elections quite closely to see INEC's preparedness to deal with elections we also know that there are issues related and I think there was an intervention about how you can interrogate the fairness and impartiality of INEC officials we certainly in civil society do have a lot of respect for the chairman of INEC we can vouch for his integrity but there are 12 other national commissioners in the electoral commission and we may not be able to say as much as we can say for the chairman and yet they are all critical part of the preparations for the elections and the chairman maybe chairman but he's not a dictatorial chairman which means that some of these actors also have a say in how the elections are conducted and sometimes their loyalty, their interests and who they serve is also a matter of concern for civil society groups and we're anxious to see that the chairman exerts his own moral authority over some of these national commissioners and get them to be more concerned about delivering free and credible elections just as he is also willing to do beyond all of this is really the fact that looking towards 2015 we know that elections will be very contentious it is perhaps likely to be one of the most contentious in Nigeria's history it's an election that as I sit here I'm sure as the chairman sits here not that he makes forecasts and none of us can tell who can win the elections in 2011 we could say yes there's ever a probability that the ruling party could win the elections today we may even go as far as saying it is likely that the ruling party may not win the elections and that I think means that there is going to be an important need for the international community to take greater interest in what happens in 2011 the president of the country did make commitments to Nigerians and to the international community that he would not interfere in the independence of the electoral commission I would accept whatever results the election body announces we would like to see the international community make such demands of him as they did in 2011 to ensure that he also makes statements committing to not interfering in the independence of the electoral commission because from the civil society point of view we know that the INEC chairman cannot say that but from the civil society point of view we have observed tendencies towards compromising the independence of the electoral commission we are of course very confident that with the chairman of the commission we all respect that this would not be allowed to happen but he has no control over all of what happens with elections so we ask the international community to join us from the civil society in Nigeria to make demands on president good luck Jonathan for him to state very publicly very categorically that he would respect the independence and the independence of the electoral commission and not interfere in its ability to conduct the elections in a free and fair manner we also would like him to make commitments publicly so that he can understand what are the results that are announced by the independent national electoral commission as a result of the conduct of elections there are several other issues the challenges in the north east of the country with the Boko Haram remains a very important issue at this time there is still in existence there is a legal questions about that whether there is a state of emergency in the north east of the country in the north east of course these are states that comprise about a sixth of Nigeria's electoral population and if elections were not to happen in the north east it would immediately go to question the full participation or even legitimacy of elections in 2015 so it's important that we keep an eye on that and ensure that whatever happens with the elections that the state of emergency does not operate in such a way as to exclude a significant population of Nigerians from participating in elections we also have to keep an eye on the security services as we speak there has been flash points in the Niger Delta region in the state of rivers where the police has a head in that state who has operated like a law unto himself not subject to the control of the inspector general of police and who has disrupted political activities by the opposition political party in that state sometimes even shooting at elected officials and one of the cases was a senator from that state who was shot by the police in the midst of organizing a public rally by the political party where the law allows for such a party to hold legally for such a rally to hold legally this is a very important issue for us there has been demands for the redeployment of that police commissioner but apparently he seems to be walking very closely with certain persons who are closely affiliated with the ruling party and we are very worried about how this would impact on the impartiality of the unfairness of the police in leading towards the elections we also have to look at the issue of how the parties conduct their primaries this would be an important contentious issue as the political parties the ruling party and of course the main opposition party would choose their candidates and we in civil society are constantly making the demands and we ask those who are watching Nigeria closely and the international community to make the same demands of the parties that they respect the internal democratic processes leading up to the choice of their candidates because this would again impact on the nature of legitimacy of the elections I would just say one more thing and stop which is really the support the work that civil society is doing in Nigeria that it is important that we get as much support as possible the dimensions of work that we would need to do in 2015 where elections would really even be greater and we ask that the international community continues to give us support to be able to achieve the various interventions that we need to do thank you so much thank you Clements Aisha over to you thank you good morning everyone happy to be here and thank you to CSIS Ford Foundation and obviously the audience for being here I think between Professor Jega and Clements really set the context properly for the elections but as a Nigerian who's lived all her life there I can't over stress that our fears as Nigerians for elections are not irrational the history of elections in Nigeria since 1959 has been really rigging election fraud violence, use of security forces that's our reality and while INEC would be commended for improving elections in 2011 the truth still remains that we still have a long way to go which was pointed out by Jega so that's the context in which we are preparing for 2015 since the 2011 elections which were partly marred by first cancellations of the first year of elections we still have on time we've still had those issues with elections that happened in 2013 particularly in Annambra which is the latest one so we can see a pattern of recurring issues particularly around materials, violence security issues and that's what is worrying most of Nigerians and worrying myself and my consequences which are mainly women and young people ironically including INEC officials women make up the majority of voters in Nigeria I think after the cleanup of the register in Annambra supposedly we had more women registered than men but at the same time women are the ones who bear the brunt mostly of the violence and they are the ones who are most likely to stay away and tell their children who are used to stay away as well so getting security right is actually very important so in that context there are really three or four key areas of concerns not to belabor the issue but the first would be the preparedness of INEC what can we do to help INEC be more prepared in terms of meeting all its objectives and its timelines and its goals we've heard Jigar talk about the register the continuous register voter registration going on cleaning up, publishing the register for voter verification typically these things and the timelines usually get pushed back how can we ensure that these things keep on track and we can prepare again Jigar has pointed out planning is key how do we help them stay with their plans he mentioned the legal framework that cannot be under scored enough we really need to get the electoral act approved these are one of the ways in which the elections are impacted without the control of what's the word I'm looking for without the control of INEC what type of timeline NASA will work with so it's very important for us to put enough pressure on the National Assembly to finish passing the electoral act and the constitution if it's going to have any impact on our electoral framework we've talked about voter apathy again that's very critical for us there are two things first I mentioned was the violence the second bit is the quality of the candidates there's a lot that could be done in terms of talking about the candidates and helping Nigerians understand how one candidate is more important or more interesting or more qualified than others in a way that's non-partisan something that's come up repeatedly is that both the media doesn't seem to be unbiased how can we get unbiased voices to talk about these candidates in a way that is very objective and measurable that will deal with voter apathy I think I won't talk about security issues because Clement has covered that extensively and it was also good to hear from Jager that despite the security challenges INEC has plans to have elections everywhere in 2015 that's very important so in terms of recommendations which is where I want to focus on I think we have a very unique opportunity with these elections in terms of looking at things that haven't been done yet in terms of improving the transparency around elections and collation Jager has mentioned many important things like color coding of the ballot papers one other thing that we really should consider and I'm sure it has its challenges but how can we help is to get our results released polling unit by polling unit now what will it take for that to happen how many polling units do we have and it's a bit troubling to hear that we're going to have more polling units at the end of the day we're not sure how many but let me give a context of 2011 election we had elections released polling unit by polling unit I live in Abuja with my three siblings and we all live in different areas so we were all in different polling units and so we had the opportunity to do as INEC asked which is stay there wait until our vote was counted and it was announced and it was pasted and the communication around this was very very good so I knew what the polling results were for my polling unit and I went home and sat in front of the TV happily waiting to see these results and it was announced so that I would be able to verify that my polling unit results were correct but unfortunately the results for FCT were announced in a lump I mean what's the point of telling us to wait until our votes are counted and posted if we're not going to know at the end of the day that when it's collated the results haven't changed between the polling units and the collation center so for me this is a very big deal with social media, Twitter, SMS Nigeria is in a very ideal position to be millions of extra eyes that are helping INEC to keep the results very viable and this is where maybe exit polls could come in how can we use this to also help create some more transparency around the process so for me use of technology is very key how can we get this into INEC's planning in addition to that I would like to say my time is up I want to just say very quickly that there's a lot to do in terms of creating knowledge and I think that's where my excitement about the 2015 elections is how can we start harnessing what's going on even from now, elections is pre-election, election and post-election I think there's a lot to do in terms of creating more transparency having websites to sort of track what's going on even from now there are lots of initiatives going on in Nigeria around CSOs that can support COMP for them and the technology they want to use to ensure that we can all sort of use the same checklist as observers during the 2015 elections all this information is very easily collated and can act as a result so for example it's not public information but if I heard that 30% women were the voters in Gombe how do I know if this is good or bad if I don't know what it was before so it's very important to start keeping that type of data to see and strengthening the elections that we're working towards but that's it, I want to say that INEC has definitely done a lot to improve their their work is commendable and also their burdens are understood but the truth is Nigerians have been bruised by decades of bad elections and just the unfortunate truth is we just have to do better thank you Thank you very much Aisha we love the policy recommendations as well finally over to you you know the beauty about speaking last is that you can just adopt what every other person has said and either make some additions or just keep quiet since this particular electoral commission came into being I think that there has been increased confidence on the part of the Nigerian people that there's a possibility that their votes may likely count if they vote now with the release of the electoral timetable by the independent national electoral commission over the weekend the political tempo and the dynamics of the Nigerian situation has just simply changed there were some politicians who did not realize that the 2015 election was so close and that the political party primaries were so close the release of the timetable has just jotted them and most of them are rushing back to their constituencies now as an individual I look towards the 2015 elections with some level of confidence but getting towards the election itself and getting the independent national electoral commission to conduct the election itself is for me at the moment not the primary issue the primary issue is that if you look at the narrative of the Nigerian situation on the part of the politicians on the part of the political parties you can see two tendencies that has just emerged the first tendency that has emerged is that there are some who believe that Nigerians should rather disintegrate if they cannot win the elections and that everybody should go away and that is what has informed some of the people who are either in support or opposed to the idea of the president organizing a national conference or organizing a national dialogue there's also another tendency and that tendency is towards the fact that look if we cannot win anti-democratic forces can take over and let everybody go home these are some of the two tendencies that has just emerged and these are very very serious tendencies within the political process and these tendencies what is defining what is going on in Nigeria now now if you look at the political configuration you can see that the ruling party and the opposition political party the main opposition political party have almost equal number of members in the House of Representatives as of now they have almost equal number of members in the Senate they have almost equal number of governors in the various states and because of that the ruling party believes that it can win, the opposition party believes that it can win the elections and this is what is making the Nigerian people nervous and this is what is heightening the political attention in the country now the implication of all this is that as at the moment Professor Atahiro Jega released the timetable for the elections Governance more or less has ceased and what we have now is just politics politics and politics are nothing more therefore the unfinished business of constitutional and electoral reform which all of us are looking up to or looking forward to may not likely happen and there are two areas for me as as an individual I was looking forward to getting the National Assembly to amend the constitutional and electoral framework for the conduct of the elections the first is in relation to the conduct of political party primaries because for those of you who are familiar with the Nigerian law section 87 of the electoral act says out in very clear detail what a political party must do in conducting his party primary elections and says that it is the candidate or the aspirant that wins the highest number of votes in a political party primary elections whose name should be submitted to the independent national electoral commission as the candidate of the political party but at the run up to the 2011 elections the national the National Assembly went and added a proviso to section 31 of the same electoral framework saying that whatever you do in relation to your political party primaries the moment the political party submits a name to the independent national electoral commission the independent national electoral commission must accept that particular name as the candidate of the political party thereby nullifying the more or less the provisions of section 87 of the electoral act so I was hoping that that particular provision will be amended but with politics in the air the possibility of having that is very very remote the second area I was looking at relates to the conclusion of pre-election activities the National Assembly amended the constitutional and electoral framework given a timeline within which election tribunals must conclude election petitions and the cut of appeal must conclude appease in relation to it and the Supreme Court must conclude but in relation to pre-election matters in relation to issues relating to political party primaries there is no time limit that is why if you go to Nigerian cause as of today there are still matters arising from pre-election activities that are still pending in court one was just resolved last week in relation to the governorship elections in imo state so we are going to finish the 2015 elections and some of the pre-election matters arising from the 2011 elections we still be pending in court so I thought that is one area that we should have concluded before politicking starts the second area relates to the issue of the prosecution of electoral offenders the chairman of the independent national electoral commission has told the national assembly that he wants to focus on organizing elections and not prosecuting electoral offenders and that they should pass the electoral offences commission bill nobody is listening because those who are there believe that if they have such a commission it may cut both ways so they are not interested because they believe that there is a possibility that they also engage in electoral practices and get away with it the third area relates to the issue of insecurity in the north east and some parts of northern Nigeria the south east and south south of Nigeria now my worry is that the electoral commission uses members of the national youth service call to conduct elections in Nigeria now in the three states where we have a state of emergency that is Adamawa state, Yobes state and Bono state most of the people deploy to those places to do their national youth service redeploy to other states so the implication is that very few parents will even agree for their sons and daughters to be engaged as ad hoc staff for the conduct of those elections so there is a challenge in relation to getting even persons to agree to serve as ad hoc staff in some of those places and also there is also a challenge in relation to the electoral framework because by the Nigerian constitution for you to be declared as the president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria or for you to win the elections you must not only have the highest number of votes you must also secure 25% of the votes in two tests of all the states of the federation and whether you conduct elections in Yobes Bono or Adamawa state does not matter in calculating the two tests you must also calculate them so if we don't have elections in those three states is going to have an impact a very serious impact on the conduct of the Nigerian elections so for me as things are very very fluid what those of us in civil society need to do is to try and find ways and means of recreating ourselves the danger I see and my worry is that why civil society groups and organizations are trying to recreate themselves the politicians and the political parties are busy floating and creating their own civil society groups and organizations and their own civil society groups and organizations are more resourced and more powerful they can place a full page adverse on the newspapers they can engage the radio stations and they can also engage journalists to write stories for them so people are finding it very difficult to determine which one is the genuine civil society group and which one is the government or political party or politicians funded civil society so I agree with Clement that the international community must keep the pressure on the Nigerians to make sure that one that they don't engage in policies and programs that will lead to the disintegration of Nigeria or that will lead to anti-democratic forces taking over the reins of power in Nigeria and I also think that we have to also find ways and means of supporting the Electoral Committee to conduct free, fair and transparent elections so far we Professor Jage and his team have done well in trying to show up the confidence of the Nigerian people on the electoral process but the elections in Anambra State and the way the Electoral Committee handled it did not give that particular confidence on the Nigerian people that as we move towards 2015 elections the elections will be better so it is on that basis that those of us from civil society groups and organizations are still working with the Electoral Committee to re-engage the Nigerian people with the Electoral process and we assure them that the problem in Anambra State was a one off thing that may not likely repeat itself. Thank you very much. Thank you, thank you to all three of you for such focused great presentations and allows us 20, 25 minutes or so for questions and answers so I'm going to open the floor straight away take a group of questions at a time please identify yourself and keep the questions to the point as possible so we can fit in as many as we can let's start with the gentleman at the back who was the first in raising his hand Yes, I want to commend all our colleagues who have spoken today and I especially thank Professor Jage for the creativity that he brings to a long running problem. My name is Emmanuel Ghebem with the US Nigeria Law Group and all of you were my colleagues when we were fighting for democracy sadly we're still outside the process critiquing the process when will we be in the process now my question is this I am somewhat baffled by the fact that we've discounted the loss of lives that occurred in 2011 as the monetization of the process is limited we're now seeing a militarization of the process and we had youth corpers who were killed including a friend of mine in 2011 my question is this what steps are being taken to ensure and end to electoral violence or post-election violence if the people who perpetrated violence have not been imprisoned that means they're still around and guess what how hard to continue in the next election just last week we had what El Rufai said he has predicted precisely that people are going to be killed in next year's elections what are we doing to mitigate the propensity for violence thank you great question let's take I'm peering around here let's take the question yes exactly right there thank you very much Lawrence Freeman from the Africa Desk I think the previous question is very important to take in mind if a thousand people were killed following this Mbappe election I think there would have been a lot of people up in arms so this is a very serious question will violence continue my comments are to Festus you mentioned that there are forces that would disintegrate Nigeria would allow it to disintegrate in the next election I wonder if you could say more about that my concern is given the continued horrible economic conditions in Nigeria that it's going to be very hard if leaders and political candidates do not address these underlying questions there could be some kind of response from the population and if this would be part of a policy where people revving up various groups against the government and I would like your comments on that let's take the lady in the middle here as well good morning ladies and gentlemen my name is Rosemary Seguero thank you so much Mr Chairman I'm the president of hope for tomorrow we observe elections we observe elections in Kenya in 2013 as the chairman said and we also we are also going to observe election in May in South Africa and also looking at Nigeria Mr Chairman we submitted our letter I have the copies here of us being accredited and I wanted to know why does it take so long for us to be accredited and when you are talking about funding because without accreditation we cannot get funding so I hope you will accredit our organization again and looking at violence involve the women and the youth who are the violence actors those women are the mothers those children those young people need to be empowered give them leadership to be security in their own countries in the stations because they are the ones who bring violence so if they are part of the leadership they wouldn't have time to bring violence so looking into that and we hope and for the best for Nigeria and we hope and look forward for doing election observation I come from Kenya anyway thank you thank you very much let's respond to those questions we are all around the theme of violence and what can be done to present it prevent it and what are the risks I encourage our other three members of the delegation to chip in with any comments as well so if you have anything just gesture Festus do you want to go first as part of the question was directed to you about the forces of disintegration in Nigeria let me just deal with the issue of electoral violence when the chairman of the electoral management body was speaking he did give you an idea of the number of electoral offenders that have been prosecuted in Nigeria arising from the 2011 elections now there are very serious challenges relating to prosecuting people who commit electoral offenses the first is that one the electoral management body does not have the requisite number of personnel to prosecute electoral offenses all over Nigeria secondly the police officers or security agencies that are on election duty sometimes they don't carry out on election duty in the states where they are ordinarily posted to on election day some of them are moved from place to the other so when they arrest an electoral offender for instance on election day they finish the elections and they go back to their base when it is time to charge the electoral offender to court or to give evidence it is also always very very difficult to get them to come and give evidence and that is why you have a situation where if you look at the statistics of even those who were charged to court arising from electoral offenses you will see that most of the cases were thrown out on grounds of a diligence in prosecution because the prosecutors could not get the police officers or those who made the arrest to come and give evidence in court so the cases had to be thrown out the other thing is that some of the people who are arrested on election day are just the full soldiers of the actual people who send them the executive offenders are never arrested because they just send out some young people to go and commit some of these electoral offenses and they simply go away and if for instance I send people to go and commit an electoral offense and most of them are arrested and then I win the governorship elections the first thing I would do is to ask my attorney general to go and enter Enole and free all of them so it is based on that we are saying that we need a separate electoral offenses commission to deal with electoral offenses and electoral offenders but the national assembly is shying away from even touching it unfortunately I was a member of the electoral reform committee and Professor Jega was also a member of the electoral reform committee in Nigeria during the process of our work there was an inter-political parties a consultative committee that was set up by the president Yara Dua to also look at the issue of electoral reforms and the vice president then who is the current president of Nigeria headed that particular consultative committee they were the ones who drew up the electoral offenses commission bill and forwarded to the electoral reform committee what we did was just to clean up what the current president drew up and then forwarded back to them I'm definitely surprised that since he came to power he's no longer talking about a bill which he drafted and the national assembly are also no longer talking about it so everybody is keeping mood on it so I believe that we need an electoral offenses commission tribunal to deal with the issue of electoral offenses on the issue of the process of disintegration if you've been reading the newspapers there are some people who believe that the current president of the federal republic of Nigeria is facing electoral challenges because he's from the Niger Delta and that since we have oil in the Niger Delta and he's facing all these challenges that anybody who wants to prevent him from contesting elections or serious elections is an enemy in fact if you've been reading the newspapers one of the prominent leaders of the Niger Delta came out in the open and said that anybody who is opposing the president's re-election is opposing God and there are some forces who have been saying if the president does not win this election Nigeria can go to blazes and nobody is talking to them nobody is saying anything to them and the president he has all these things and he keeps quiet he has never for one day come out to say no Nigeria as an entity has come to stay Nigeria as an entity is a sovereign state and I will not encourage anybody that will tamper with this sovereignty he has never come out to say that so what that means is that he is also giving some tacit approval and tacit encouragement to some of these people who are saying these things and then there are those on the other side who are saying this is our chance to win and if we cannot win then we don't care who takes over and when you say if you cannot win you don't care who takes over we know who you want to take over so I think that all these things coupled with some of the economic challenges we have and some of the security challenges we have in the north east and some parts of the north is making people not to have confidence going towards the 2015 elections but I think that with the way things are going if civil society engages this process if the electoral management body gives the Nigerian people confidence and if the international community engages this process and says look we are focusing on Nigeria we don't want anything to happen to the sovereignty of the country I think that some of the forces that are calling for disintegration and some of the forces that are saying that anti-democratic forces can take over will be very careful in what they do and what they say definitely there is a level of impunity which again goes way back but I think there are many things that we can do because it's not likely we are going to get an election what is it called? election exactly before now in 2015 so what can we do? I know that the national human rights commission is preparing a very extensive report on election malpractice and it's due to be released anytime soon I think it's something that all African watchers should be looking out for because it's going to name some people I think there's an opportunity here to use the media we've talked about the use of the media can INEC use the media to focus on these 800,000 people that we hear on the list who are they? what are their names? are they on the electoral register? can they be punished in some other way? we have to think creatively because as I said we can't rely on just the National Offenses Commission which will probably take a few years to do again there's a way to use youth groups, women groups one speaker mentioned the fact that women are the ones who can talk to the young people who are their children maybe these are the opportunities that we need between now and the 2015 elections to highlight the importance of not getting involved in violent acts we just have to think about ways around the issues so I really think INEC too has a role to play 100,000 people who committed offences can their names be published? what are the rules that talk about privacy that would not allow them to do this? but how can we use what tools we already have instead of waiting for something that we don't have? thanks Abhi-Ele one of our other delegates has some comments thank you very much one of the things that I want to say particularly relating to the issue of electoral violence I think that one of the biggest challenge that we have as Nigerians is how do we change the narrative what do we have in the space now everybody is talking about the quality is so heated up that everybody is talking about violence so it is one of the challenges that we have to address as a society how do we begin to turn that discussion around to something that will be much more beneficial to the Nigerian people and I think that with that we'll be able to begin to see how we can address the issue of violence in elections I participated in the monitoring of the election in a number of states and I'm aware that I first put in a lot of money in working around the National Association for Peaceful Election and one of the things that they were doing was to look at early warning signs around elections and I participated in one of the programs that they organized with INEC in a number of states where they had to go to all the local government and they used beyond the traditional method of passing messages to people they used town criers they spoke with people in town all to ensure that the election does not come with violence and we also went to the extent of training civil society organizations about identifying early warning signs that was a website where information was posted about manifestation of violence in the election and I think that going by that for civil society to be able to strengthen our work around preventing election violence from the electoral cycle from the pre to the during and also to post election to ensure that we monitor and bring out some of the early warning signs and the other thing about changing the narrative is also that it's important for us to begin to affirm election as an accountability tool in Nigeria and I think that's what we have not done for a long time where people who are politicians who lack no ideology today they want political party tomorrow then another one and of course they are ready to go to the third to fourth fifth and it keeps going like that meaning that you are even there in politics for no reason so our politics in Nigeria cannot be business as future and I think that that is where the civil society can also make a very strong intervention to ensure that we begin to change the face of politics to an issue based politics then also to change the face of election in such a way that people will believe in mandate protection so every Nigeria you know that you have to protect your vote and work towards it and that's why I support what Clement said earlier that there is a need for a lot of support we are not starting earlier I must say the election is February that's less than one year so we need all the support that we need to take to be able to go the right way in 2015 elections thank you thank you and yes some comments as well from another of our delegates please just a little bit on the issue of electoral violence which is actually at the center of the core challenges we have in Nigeria and I want to emphasize the fact that people are not going to stop being violent because some people talk to them violence is going to stop when Nigeria begins to punish violence and that has to be made very clear I've not seen any jurisdiction anywhere in the world where people stop violence because it was fashionable somebody has got to be punished for committing an offense and if you look at it critically from what has been said by my colleagues you will see that for the fact that a sitting president who was part of configuring an electoral violence commission bill does not want to talk about the bill anymore you agree with me that they are configuring an arrangement for violence to happen because I don't know what other thing you would do rather than push the bill you prepared why you were outside the political space when you have all the power now to make sure that this bill is passed in one month and I can assure you because of the contentions at the moment we're both the opposition and the ruling party are having a 50-50 thing which is healthy for Nigeria I must confess passing that bill will receive bipartisan alliance because at the moment there is the tension on both sides as Fabian noted Festus noted so that bill is a bill we need to talk about now you know despite the politicking going on it is becoming clear to everybody that violence might murder that election and there is need for an elite consensus on addressing violence as a first step towards this election and I think that is what the international community need to push with us that is not just going to be an issue of persuading people Nigeria can pass bills in 48 hours if they want to this electoral offences commission bill can be passed and put to force before this election and I can assure you that if we don't do that just take it that some people are configuring this election for violence that is one and then on the issue of voter register which is core to what we are doing and I thank Professor Jiga for being very proactive on that because that is one of the things that will trigger the intra-election violence in 2015 if it is not addressed we are all in a number as he noted and there were clearly people who couldn't vote because their names weren't on the register they don't understand your electronic biometric and all of those highfalutin words the only issue is that they got somewhere and registered in 2011 and voted and in 2013 they went there and they were told they can't vote so there is a fundamental issue without register and I think there is need for the international community to support the commission of course we are all of us in the civil society are willing to support the commission to make sure that we have a credible voter register before the 2015 election and that means that the work on that register will start like yesterday it is something of high national priority and demands an emergency attention because even though INEC compiles the register the voter register is a public document that should belong to the people of Nigeria so the idea is that moving out of this session today whatever can be done should be done for us in the next six months to have a register that Nigerian citizens can relate with that a woman who sells gary in the market or gary is a cassava product anyway no six months in advance where she is going to vote in 2015 and understand to a very reasonable extent the logistics that will follow her to make her she votes if we don't take care of that some of the intra-election violence as did happen in Kenya I hope our sister will share the experience with us on how they got across that bridge you know may also occur here so that is very important and then just a little one on the electoral day staff because INEC has got these permanent staff who are all working with the chair as noted we believe in the chair but we don't seem to believe in most of the other guys there yeah while we are hoping that we'll believe with them as we move on and the system get better now those ones are the core staff but on election day a lot more people are engaged whose actions and inactions impact heavily on the election they call them ad hoc staff which is a word I think we may also drop from now moving forward because they actually are very ad hoc their knowledge maybe ad hoc in most cases and everything about them is ad hoc you know including being part of post election things you may not find some of them again because before now come from different quarters of course with NYAC if your service does finish in that state before the electoral issues are concluded you may not even be around to give evidence so but moving from here it is important to make those people to know that they are not just ad hoc they are election day staff and they must be trained sustainably to be able to do the job because even the training protocol before now has been ad hoc which may not be unconnected with the funding of INEC which we hope will improve if INEC does open up to say what they want in terms of funding so arranging for the election day staff to be properly trained on what their duties are and as my brother noted to have them also permitted to some legal instruments that will make them accountable for whatever they do within the election would be a good way to stop all of these intra-election processes that mess up our election and generate a lot of violence thank you very much thank you very much Jude now where we've already ran way over time but I just want to wrap things up with just one final question perhaps to Clement you can answer it we've been talking a lot or people have been asking questions or offering advice on what the US can best provide in terms of support going into this election period obviously there's budgetary and technical assistance but it seems one of the messages coming through particularly on this issue of violence is diplomatic support in terms of speaking out holding the government political parties and politicians to account what would your response be Clement to wrap things up in terms of what you would like to see most of all from the US and perhaps what you wouldn't like to see from the US in terms of support in the next 12 months well I think you've given my answer actually basically we need diplomatic support we need the message that is coming out from Nigeria in terms of advocacy by civil sided groups taking up here in Washington and in London I think it's important that in the meetings also in Nigerian government officials it is stated quite clearly what the expectations are of the free and fair elections and the government's responsibility to respect the independence of electoral commission and provide a conducive atmosphere for the conduct of free and fair elections in Nigeria Thank you very much and just because we haven't heard from Enemo yet as the sixth member of our delegation he just wants to say something briefly as well with a little word and a microphone is just coming his way now imminently please stand up so everyone can see Thank you Just a few words on how we can mitigate electoral violence in Nigeria As we've heard from everyone here there is the likelihood that there will be more violence come 2015 and I think this is from a civil society perspective that one there is need for ROSS as a people especially the relevant agencies to curb the inflammatory utterances of some of the politicians is getting to hurt people are saying things that can be done about cabin the very very violent and inflammatory statements by some politicians secondly I think that some of our journalists they should undergo some sort of conflict sensitive training there is need for them to do that because again that is contributing to the very volatile and heated debates that is ongoing in the country so there is something journalists can do there is something in the way that they present the issues that can definitely help contribute to a more serene environment for political debate to take place leading up to the elections finally I think that there should be sustained voters education and this is the time to do it civil society, hollow force here have a responsibility to ensure that leading up to the elections we go to the communities engage the people in the communities talk to the youths talk to the mothers the children the youths who carry out these activities they have mothers talk to them try and sensitize Nigerians on the need for our youth not to die for a politician it is very important thank you thank you very much it's a good note to end this morning's session it's been a great conversation we've covered a huge amount of ground and we're going to have an opportunity in future sessions to delve in more detail into some of the subsections that are wrapped up in this election but please join me in thanking Professor Jago and all the rest of our delegates this morning for a great conversation