 INEC acts to disqualify or beat over $150 million Diaspora funding, and South-South suffers leadership deficit across board, says retired diplomat Ambassador Joe Keshi. This is POST Politics, and I'm Mary Anacorn. A group under the aegis of Tinubu Shatima Connect has urged the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, to disqualify the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Pete Albee, and his running mate, Ahmed Baba Datti, from the 2023 presidential race over violation of the Electoral Act on campaign funding. The group has also vowed to begin legal action to prevent the Labour Party from participating in the 2023 presidential election for engaging in activities that contraven the Electoral Act. Joining us to discuss this is Kunle Lowell, he's the Executive Director of the Electoral College of Nigeria. It's so good to have you join us, Kunle. Let's start by laying the foundation. Let's go to what the Electoral Act has to say about this, because we also have seen that several people have kicked against it. Several people are also in support of this group, even though this seems to be more of a party A versus party B. But what are your thoughts when you first heard about diaspora funding from former Governor Pete Albee? Okay, first I need to make clear that every Nigerian president that has emerged has emerged with a lot of diaspora funding backing, from a Basin jaw down to President Mohammad Bari. Section 85 of the Electoral Act 2022 is very clear. It states in Section A that parties cannot receive or have assets outside Nigeria. But you know, coming down a little bit to when it goes to candidates, it is totally silent on candidates. And there's a clear reason. Candidates only have limits based on campaign funding, like the president has a limit of five billion, which is not supposed to exceed. And we can say a lot of presidential of the big parties have exceeded such amounts, which is a violation of the Electoral Act. But you know, coming down to Governor Anko, it just simply states candidates, and there's a reason why. If you look at whoever came up with the Constitution or whoever came up with the Electoral Act and sat down and looked at this thing, it is so that foreign influence will not influence our political parties. Foreign influence cannot influence a candidate. Foreign influence influence in a candidate, a political party, therein lies the problem. And I'm surprised most lawyers, I think, maybe because they receive either, too, from different angles are deciding to come up with funny ideas when this particular talk is being mentioned. You raised a very important issue, especially with the big, major political parties. I mean, 2015, CERAP had urged political parties to make their campaign finances public so that they could tell if they were exceeding or not. Well, in 2022, that's still not been done. And INEC, CERAP, I beg your pardon, at some point, you know, decided that they were going to take the matter to court. I do not know what the outcome of that has been, because here we are again, another campaign cycle, and then elections are going to happen. Why can't the books be opened? Well, I think the books can be opened because, I'll be honest, senatorial limit, I believe, is 100 million. And I believe that has been cut down already from, if you look at how much candidates even spent on forms, like if you look at the presidential for the APC, it was 100 million. So you are already locking down your five billion limit. And that's just the form alone, minus every other thing that went down with it, the travel, the expenses. It, of course, will put us in a very dire corner. And I think nobody's ready to open the books. And because one person is not opening the book, that's Incubant Party and the main opposition are not opening the books. I must say everybody else has shut their books, because clearly everybody violates their electoral act on campaign financing in Nigeria. Why do we have an electoral act if we're going to violate it? Needlessly. Because, I mean, we made so much noise about this, we pushed for it. Now we have it. But then we're not, we reckless abandon, we're just saying, we don't care, we'll just do business as usual. What's the essence? The problem in Nigeria has never been the laws that Nigeria has. The problem has been actually following the laws Nigeria has. So most people that do not understand the Constitution will come up and tell you that the 1999 Constitution is just a piece of trash. But the truth is that the 1999 Constitution is not even followed up to 40% in Nigeria. That's interesting. Let's talk about if this political parties keep count, because you have said, you've mentioned so many things that somebody should be keeping account. Could it also be that nobody's keeping account and that's why these books are not open? I'm asking because we're asking for leaders who are going to be accountable to us, who will be responsible. If the political parties at that level are unwilling to show that level of accountability, why should we trust the politicians that they're fielding? I must say that whoever drafts, the draftsmen of this particular electoral act also understand under which parameters these politicians function. So the left gaps, there's limited electoral funding, but it's so silent on who exactly should prosecute, whether I neg the police or anybody else. It doesn't state who will prosecute. It doesn't state who exactly will do what. But it does state, okay, nobody should exceed social amount. Okay, nobody exceeds and there's the fine for exceeding. There's the option that you might even be kicked out of the race if you exceed. But now, who exactly is going to do it? There's lack of jurisdiction. And nobody's even looking at this. And it's amazing when I hear senior advocates trying to argue on things that don't matter. Let's talk more about the diaspora funding issue. Now, there have been a push and a call for diaspora voting, which we haven't even been able to cross that threshold. Why do you think that former Governor Peter will be decided to go in that direction? Because we see that former, I'm so sorry, Mr. President, when he was still a candidate, asked Nigerians to support his election. And people gave us as little as 500 naira. Why did Governor Obino go in that direction? Why did he have to go in the direction of the diaspora? Is it because he's trying to give them a sense of belonging? What exactly is his angle? I know you're not him, but what do you think? Okay, so I haven't been a candidate before. I think I'll make this clear. I was a candidate during the 2019 elections. 2015, we only seem to remember when the Incubant President decided to approach Nigerians and people were giving 500 naira. What do you think his conversation in the Shatam House was about? It was to influence Nigerians that lived in the U.K. to give to his campaign. Nigeria actually makes more money from Nigerians in diaspora than we do from Kudo right now, but they are not valid enough to be part of an electoral cycle that will dictate their leaders. That's a joke. And going into Peter Obis's mind, I think first things, they are Nigerians. Second, he's not going to Soviet USSR to go and ask for money. He's not going to the Israelis to ask for money. He's going to Nigerians that live in diaspora who have influence, who have relatives here, who also give to this country's GDP. So the actual thought process is if Nigeria is better, these people want to come back. Obis ended up with the same card, which was why he was able to get a lot of people walking in diaspora to join his government because he made it a complete thing. So there's no presidential candidate. And if you're looking at 2019, Fela Dorotoe was part of that, Kiksimogalu was part of that. The Incubant president, President Muambou Dupuwari, to also sort diaspora funds. There's no president in Nigeria that has not sought diaspora funds. I think why this is an issue is because Mr. Peter Obis has clearly shown he's not playing politics as usual. And there's a little fear that maybe the present traction which he's gaining is unsettling the status quo. Let's zero in to Peter Obis now because I'm just impassing Professor Pat to tell me who's also a strong ally of the presidential candidate of the Labour Party has dared INAG to, on this issue of funding, he's dared them to see if they could try to, what's the word now, try to disqualify the governorship candidate, but that's on the one hand. But let's talk about the tragic tree of the campaign of Governor Peter Obis and where it's going. Now I have heard people say that he's followers, and this many people might not be as smart as the man who they're trying to vote for. And this mostly owing to how they react on social media, but does that, is that what we should give as a generalization for all those who are hashtag obedient? Well, as regards the hashtag obedient from a non-partisan perspective which I represent, I would say what we saw in 2015 was far more bloody than what we're seeing right now. And 2015 was more with the trade of words which were, we cannot be used. I remember the Incuban president then, President Goodlock Jonathan being depicted in a coffin. You know, it was really bad. You had people that were political elite, one who's a president governor, accusing the president then of being part of Boko Haram and a lot of other things. So if there's any action right now being portrayed by the obedient, I will clearly say they were taught in 2015 by those who acted in 2015. But it's, again, I'm not in any way trying to put them on the chopping board, but we're talking about to Peter I'll be here and what he's going on, how he's going on his political journey. If we're saying that, or they're saying that this is a different kind of politicking, he's bringing a new Nigeria, this is a new movement away from the old. Why are you towing the same lines of mudslinging and dirty politics in quotes of 2015? How can we tell that you're not the wheat and rather you're the wheat and not the shaft? I need to say at this point that we have created Nigeria we meet. So politics at this point will only be fought like a tug of war to the people who only understand one thing. I've clearly seen a side that clearly states that if you are not Europe I am not standing with the sons of Europe I've heard that. And I've seen that publicly. That's from the, I don't want to mention but from a particular presidential candidate. We've seen people saying that if you're not with a party that if you're not Northern it's not your turn to rule. We've seen, I've seen all that. So I think why the obedience gets on everybody's nerve is that for once it's not the usual suspects. Meaning this usual social media influencers that are in control of the obedience. These are just normal Nigerians participating and I think it upsets a lot of people. And for me I think every other campaign should just face its campaign, do what it needs to do, convince Nigerian people. We need to turn our politics ideological and that goes across board for everybody. But I'm not justifying the fact that the obedience are reacting the way they do. Yes, if they really act that way. But what I'm saying is that- What do you mean if they really act that way? Because- You don't think that, I mean you've seen several non-partisan, we're talking about celebrities. We've seen people call them out. We've seen the professor Hannibal already called them out and say you cannot go this route. We've seen Femi-Kuti, the likes saying, well we also have a right to decide who we want to follow. It's an election, it's open to everybody. I've seen so many people caution them, not necessarily say we hate them, but they're saying this is not the path to talk again. I'm sure that some people say, who are you to tell us what to do? But if we are looking towards a new Nigeria, should we be creating enemies? Being honest, understanding the political terrain, I need to say something. The same way APC taught in 20, the APC in 2015 promised change. They told a very, very violent path. It's clear that Nigeria's trajectory in politics to change things must be violent, because not violent, I don't support any of this, but when I mean violent, I mean verbally. And that is because we have grown to become a society that thrives on such violent interactions. Nigerians do not easily communicate in the best ways without using insultive words. And this comes from both sides. Virtually, if we are in the studio now, somebody from the APC and somebody from the PDP on this side, it would be like having two assassins and a bone in between. That's what will happen. So that's what has become our politics. That's what the politics we created. And that's the politics that everybody else. So do we wait to have a hero? Because I used the word hero loosely here. To be able to sanitize the system, to change the narrative that you have said that had been, you know, do we wait for one person or should we be looking within to see how we can change the narrative as opposed to waiting for one person to come and help us, you know, tell that lie? The truth about Nigeria is that we're going to have multiple heroes. You're going to have a hero in your local government. You're going to have a hero in your ward. You're going to have a hero in your state. But we're not yet at that point. We still have, those heroes are around. The problem with Nigeria is that we do not know what greatness is and we affirm greatness to people that don't deserve to be great. And that's the greatest mistake we make always. And that's why we end up following somebody like a sheep and then finding out that he's not actually what we bargained for. And you find yourself in that situation multiple times. So till Nigerians become politically literate enough to understand, okay, I'm following the Senate or why? Because he proposed and passed 35 bills in one year in office. Then that will be someone to follow. Not following someone that has been 16 years in the Senate and is flouting the same electoral act by buying two presidential form, a presidential form and the Senatorial form. No offense to my dimension. Finally, you talked about political education. The media of course has its job cut out for it. The NOA which is half past dead. We have other civil societies and the civic space is large and asking for more hands to do justice to the voter education and civic education. How much of that ground do you think we've been able to cover as we prepare for 2023? I'll be honest, the CSOs have done a lot of work. I would say there are a few CSOs on doing the work like we always put out. There are a few media on doing the work, especially when they cannot differentiate between an aspirant and a candidate which you find sometimes in the media. The fact that we only seem to bring two parties to a particular room instead of as the electoral act demands, if any candidate is given 10 minutes, every other candidate participating in that election must be granted 10 minutes. So because we are politically illiterate, selling and education by illiterate people politically to very illiterate people politically is a problem. How do we, again, because September 28th is just around the corner, how much ground do you think we can cover? Because again, I have seen civil society organizations campaign for a person. And I actually really wonder if these are civil society, just as you said. Again, how can Nigerians be pointed in the right direction in terms of the civic education? We do it here on Plus TV. We do it every day. We talk about these issues and allow people to understand, we break it down. But not everybody watches television. Not everybody listens to the radio. So are we taking it to them? I'll be honest. I used to be of the perception that not everybody gets the message. But I realized when you want to find out that David O is doing giveaway, even if you are in any corner in Nigeria, you will know about it. So Nigeria selectively do not think they don't know politics. They assume they know and the biggest mistake is they assume they actually know more than they think they know. Like there is a myth of, ah, don't vote for a smaller party because a smaller party cannot win a election. Okay, fine. That's a myth. Now, the reason why I have to dispel that myth here is because if that were true, why do the two big parties spend so much time vote buying and boxing as season ballad boxes and continue? Anyway, the new electoral act has pushed out coalition centers, so they've lost that forward on that front. But therein lies the problems. We have myths within our culture which makes us think that some things are not possible. We don't even know what a senatorial house of rep actually does. People will tell you, ah, I can call my house of rep. That means he's working. No. You have people that have served costing Nigeria over two billion Naira in allowances for about 16 years and have not passed one bill. That is a problem. It's interesting. The conversation that we must continue to have, of course, as we get ready for the elections, Kunle Laol is the executive director of the Electoral College of Nigeria. Always a pleasure to have you here. Thank you. We'll take a quick break when we return. We'll be talking about the Niger Delta, especially the South-South. And of course, what a former diplomat had to say about the deficits in leadership in the South-South. Stay with us.