Former Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan has demanded that the country’s custom of holding off-year elections be discontinued.
He voiced worry that the presidential race would eventually turn into an off-cycle election if the nation kept conducting off-season polling.
After casting his ballot in the off-cycle Bayelsa State gubernatorial election on Saturday at Ward 13 Otuoke, Ogbia LGA, Jonathan made this statement in an interview with reporters.
He urged the National Assembly to see to it that the off-season was prohibited, calling it strange and not a worldwide best practice.
The former president, while congratulating Bayelsa, Imo and Kogi States for the peaceful conduct of the polls, said, “Basically this is an off-season election. I get worried about the issue of off-season elections, and I will use this unique opportunity to plead with the National Assembly that we need to block off-season elections.
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“It is very odd, it’s not a global best practice. A country can elect its people at different times, like the American election and some countries. They may not elect everybody at the same time but the only time they go on to conduct elections, they elect everybody that is supposed to be elected.
“If we continue with this trend of off-season elections based on the interpretation of our law by a judicial officer, it will come to a time when the presidential election in Nigeria may be conducted off-season.
“Probably, that is time that the media and others will realise it. Look at the American (US) system, everybody knows when American elections will be conducted. That’s the standard in other countries.
“And when I say presidential election in Nigeria may be off-season one day, some may say ‘why, how?’. It almost happened in 2007 when I contested as running mate to the late President Yar’Adua.
“In that election, seven Justices presided over the case, three of them through their judgement held that the election be annulled, and four of them sustained it.
“If one of them had crossed over, by now, the Nigerian presidential election would have been off-season.”
