President Muhammadu Buhari Monday in Abuja said the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) owed Nigerians nitty gritty clarification for its choice to defer the general elections.
He spoke at the All Progressives Congress (APC) emergency caucus meeting at the party secretariat, stating that ‘‘definitely, the reasons such incompetence manifested have to be explained to the nation. After the elections, we have to know exactly what happened and who is responsible.
‘‘The constitution and the laws protect INEC but they must not take us for granted. If for example, the National Assembly refused to approve what INEC wanted, then INEC would have more than enough reasons why they couldn’t perform.
‘‘If the time for the constitutional elections, four years after was not obeyed by the government and the system, INEC will have a case. But we do not understand why this inefficiency and we have to move into details after the election to find out who’s responsible.’’
The President said there was no justification ‘‘to wait for only six hours to postpone the votes’’, in the early long periods of February 16, adding that the electoral commission had time and resources it needed to conduct the polls.
He also utilized the event to caution every single political party to guarantee a domain free from terrorizing and savagery for every qualified electorate to gently cast their vote on the Election Day.
The President declared that he has guided security organizations to contain any demonstrations of disorder previously, amid and after the elections.
‘‘We are not going to be blamed of trying to rig the elections. I want Nigerians to be respected.
Let them vote whoever they want across the parties. I am not afraid, I have gone to all 36 states and Abuja and I think I have enough support across the country,’’ he said. President Buhari urged all APC supporters to vote peacefully in the upcoming elections.
‘‘We have so much to do and I think we should again go back to our loyal, committed people in all constituencies. If anything happens we have nobody to blame.
‘‘We have to tell our constituencies that they have to be patient and act in a very responsible way by going peacefully to vote again, and they should depend on party representatives at each of the 176,000 polling units,’’ he said.