Kabiru Gaya, chairman of the Senate committee revealed this while answering questions at the NAN Forum in Abuja on Tuesday, February 2.

Gaya said “One of the people who came to the public hearing submitted the memorandum, and argued that the word underage was not his, but that any woman or man that is married should be considered as an adult. That was his reason. Our own resolve is that if a woman is at the age of 16 and she gets married, she should not be allowed to vote. Generally, there was a lot of noise about. It was in a memorandum submitted by a group of people and they have their rights as Nigerians. But when we came to the committee, we discussed a lot on that and at the end of the day, we felt we could not go along with that suggestion and it was dropped. If we move elections to Fridays some people will say it is their worship day; if we move it to Sundays, some other people will say it is also their worship day. So, that suggestion was also thrown out.”

The national assembly joint panel made the recommendation to a technical committee which will work on the new electoral act proposed by the federal lawmakers, even though the constitution currently places the eligible age for voting at 18.

This came two weeks ago after some stakeholders made a similar recommendation. Kabiru Gaya, chairman of the Senate committee on INEC who spoke at the inauguration of the technical committee in Abuja said the recommendation is a unanimous decision by the joint panel.

Gaya said “The joint committee has proposed that if a lady who is not up to 18 years is married, she should be considered to be mature enough and be eligible to vote.”

However after INEC chairman, Mahmood Yakubu said the issue of voting age is a constitutional matter and the law also recognises 18 as marriageable age, Aisha Dukku, chairperson of the house of representatives committee on INEC said the recommendation cannot be thrown out because it was suggested by stakeholders at the public hearing.

Dukku said “It is already in the electoral act amendments submitted in the last assembly, so it cannot be thrown away just like that.  We should look at it and come up with something instead of throwing it away. It is not from us but from the stakeholders on the day of the public hearing held in the 8th assembly.”