Ken Ugbechie on Channels TV
A Nigerian editor and author, Mr. Ken Ugbechie, has faulted the display of their ballot papers after voting by President Muhammadu Buhari and other top politicians, insisting that such gesture is contrary to the provision of Electoral Act 2022.
Ugbechie who is also the Publisher of Political Economist NG made the argument while featuring in 2023 Verdict, a political watch programme on Channels Television on Tuesday.
Recall that on the day of the Presidential election, Buhari openly displayed his ballot paper after voting for the Presidential candidate of his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Ugbechie argued that such act which was also emulated by other senior politicians flouted Section 122 of the Electoral Act which seeks to promote the secrecy of the ballot.
Section 122 of Electoral Act 2022 states:
(1) Every person in attendance at a polling unit including every officer charged with the conduct of an election and his or her assistants and every polling agent and candidate in attendance at a polling station or at the collation centre, as the case may be, shall maintain and aid in maintaining the secrecy of the voting.
(2) No person in attendance at a polling booth under this section shall, except for some purpose authorised by law, communicate to any person information as to the name or number on the register of any voter who has or has not voted at the place of voting.
(3) No person shall —
(a) interfere with a voter casting his or her vote, or by any other means obtain or
attempt to obtain in a polling unit, information as to the candidate for whom a voter in that place is about to vote for or has voted for; or
(b) communicate at any time to any other person information obtained in a polling unit as to the candidate to whom a voter is about to vote or has voted for.
(4) Any person acting contrary to the provisions of this section commits an offence and is liable on conviction to a maximum fine of N100,000 or imprisonment for a term of three months or both.
Ugbechie argued that by exposing his ballot paper after voting, Buhari and other politicians who acted likewise contravened the law.
While espousing the role of the media in election reportage, Ugbechie charged journalists to interrogate and scrutinise the processes of election to establish whether the actors conform to the manual of the election which is the Electoral Act 2022.
He noted that the Nigeria media has become as partisan, if not more partisan, than the politicians they report.
“What we now have is a case of partisan journalists reporting partisan politics,” he said, adding that such trend is a threat to democracy and public peace.
On the simmering impasse generated by the 2023 Presidential election, he charged journalists to moderate their language so as not to add in the heating up of the polity.
