In view of 2015 elections, professor Attahiru Jega, Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC and one-time national leader of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, alongside senior officials of the INEC were in Lagos last week for an in-house strategic retreat.
Held in close collaboration with the Democratic Governance for Development, DGD Project, the retreat, an initiative of the United Nations Development Programme, UNDP, was to produce a strategic framework to guide the commission in its plans towards enthroning a regime of transparency in its management of elections in the country.
On the fringes of the retreat, Professor Jega spoke on the commission’s preparations for next month’s gubernatorial election in Ondo State, the readiness of the commission to fully turn the chapter in the poor conduct of elections and the prospects of a new style in the commission.
What exactly is your agenda at this retreat? stating the agenda of the retreat, Jega boasted that, “by the time we finish this retreat in Lagos we would have come up with carefully prepared draft of a strategic plan that will guide all our actions between now and 2015 so that we can we have the kind of elections that Nigerians would be very, proud of and we have no doubt that given the commitment of all the staff in INEC and given all the preparations that we have been doing that this is an objective which we can attain.”
Also laying more emphasis on improving the credibility of the voters register, the INEC brain box affirmed that there would be a remarkable improvement in the commission’s activities, “As we prepare for 2015, our efforts to bring remarkable improvements are all inclusive and they cover all key areas of the commission’s activities. We want to be a very, very effective and efficient election management body, we want to be a body that creates a level playing field for all contestants and all political actors and we want to be a body that is transparent, that is committed and that has integrity in the way in which it delivers electoral services.”
Comments