Catholic Bishops have appealed to the Judiciary to save Nigeria’s democracy, arguing that all eyes are now on it to remedy the obvious irregularities that marred the 2023 general elections.
The Bishops of Owerri Ecclesiastical Province who met in Umuahia, Abia State, expressed disappointment over the failure of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, to live up to its promise to deliver a credible poll.
In a communiqué issued after their meeting at Umuahia Diocesan Secretariat, the Bishops urged the Judiciary to redeem the situation in the interest of Nigeria’s democracy.
“The hope, at the moment is that the judiciary will rise to the challenge and rescue our ailing democratic experiment”, the communique read in part.
The Bishops accused INEC of colluding with corrupt politicians to compromise the polls.
”Many people had trusted the repeated assurances by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to deliver a credible electoral process, namely, to come up with an impartial standard for screening candidates, to organize the logistics for conducting free and fair elections, to transmit voting results electronically from polling stations in real-time, to eliminate cases of ballot stuffing and vote stealing, etc.
“Sadly, the electoral process was riddled with irregularities. INEC and some of the political actors dashed the hopes of our people.
“Consequently, the results of the last elections can hardly be considered as reflecting the overall will of the people, and are still being contested. And this continues to darken the cloud of uncertainty and tension that has enveloped the nation.”
