Kogi State Government has reactedto the recent visa ban imposed on politicians alleged to have rigged theNovember 2019 election in the state by the United States of America.
The US Government had on Monday slammed a visa restriction on someindividuals for allegedly rigging the November 2019 governorship elections in Kogiand Bayelsa States as well as in the run-up to the September and October 2020Edo and Ondo governorship polls.
But in a letter addressed to the Ambassador of the United States of Americasigned by the Secretary to the Government of Kogi State, Mrs Folashade ArikeAyoade, the state governor, Alhaji Yahaya Bello, said the US should havecreated room no matter how slim for a fair hearing.
In the letter titled, “Re: Visa Restrictions On Individuals And Inclusion OfThe 2019 Kogi State Gubernatorial Elections In US State Department List OfAllegedly Compromised Elections – A Letter Of Protest”, Kogi State Governmentalso urged the US to accord greater empathy, more civility and much lessdisruption to nascent democracies.
The letter read in part, “The Kogi State Government became aware of a UnitedStates Government list of individuals who received US visa restrictions foralleged electoral malpractices via a Press Statement to that effect posted onyour Embassy website.
“In your own words, the still-unnamed individuals are cited as guilty of‘acts of violence, intimidation, or corruption that harmed Nigerians andundermined the democratic process.’ They are also alleged to ‘have operatedwith impunity at the expense of the Nigerian people and undermined democraticprinciples and human rights.
“You also noted in the statement that the sanctions are derived fromunspecified misconducts by the said individuals which extend from theFebruary/March 2019 General Elections in Nigeria through the off-cycle November2019 gubernatorial elections in Kogi and Bayelsa to the as yet unheldgovernorship contests in Edo and Ondo States. Please note that for the purposesof this protest letter we are only interested in the citations to the extentthat they are referable to Kogi State and her citizens.
“For the most part, we concede that elections in Nigeria are complex affairswhich will continue to require improvements for the foreseeable future. The2019 Kogi State Gubernatorial Election was also not without its challenges.However, it is also crystal clear from critical and composite analyses of therecords (official, media, observers, etc) of the November 16, 2020 polls thatregrettable incidents were limited to a few polling units, while theoverwhelmingly larger portions of the ballot were free, fair and credible.”
Governor Bello maintained that in line with Nigerian law, the few politicalparties and individuals who alleged widespread electoral malpractices had freerein to contest the outcome in court.
According to him, they vigorously litigated their claims over a grueling9-month period, through a 3-step hierarchy of courts, to the inescapableconclusion at the Supreme Court of Nigeria that the said electionssatisfactorily complied with the Nigerian Constitution and the Electoral Act.
He continued, “Our concern right now is not the prerogative of the UnitedStates of America to impose entry restrictions on anyone, for any or no reasonat all, which prerogative remains unfettered, but the room for atrociousmisinformation which the timing of your Press Statement and the mention of theKogi elections therein has created in our state.
“For the February and March 2019 General elections, your advisory came outin July 2019, long before the Supreme Court delivered her judgments in thepetitions against those elections, including challenges to President MuhammaduBuhari’s re-election. The presumption is that in spite of your intervention,the Supreme Court still discovered no merit in the petitions and dismissed themaccordingly.
“In our case, ie, Kogi State, you made the tactical decision to release theupdate shortly after the Supreme Court delivered judgments in the 4 petitionswhich made it before her. Amongst a plethora of well-reasoned pronouncement theApex Court dismissed the said petitions for failing to prove their allegationsand for having no ‘scintilla of merit’. The inference from your timing is thatthe judgment is somehow tainted and did not meet the justice of the case,thereby casting aspersions, not only on the Nigerian Judiciary, but on thesecond term mandate freely bestowed on His Excellency, Governor Yahaya Bello bythe good people of Kogi State.
“We find this unacceptable, and we protest your presumption. The least youcould have done, if indeed this is about democracy and human rights as claimedis create room, no matter how slim, for fair hearing. As it is now, partisanspeculations as to who is indicted, who is not and for what, has becomecudgels, furiously swung in the media space by all comers. Your action hastherefore added abundant grist to the rumour mills and electrified themerchants of fake news”.
He further noted that other players in the state’s political space,including candidates and officials of opposition political parties which lostthe elections and could not prove their allegations in court have now latchedonto the US visa ban, holding media conferences and making press releases,claiming that the United States has justified their wild allegations andconspiracy theories where the courts and the administrative quarters failed.This, according to him is utterly regrettable.
He stressed that the governor is not challenging the visa but was onlyregistering the strongest protest as a state to the collateral and unwarrantedinterference its political and social processes which it represents.
“We believe that if the United States of America, despite her commandingheights and much longer experience as the acclaimed Bastion of Democracy in theworld, is still locked in a fight to defend the integrity of her own electoralprocesses to this very day, then she ought to accord greater empathy, morecivility and much less disruption, to nascent democracies”, the letter further
noted.