Despite the outcry over the fee of N10 million for nomination forms stipulated for local government chairmanship candidates, the Kano State Independent Electoral Commission has refused to shift grounds, saying there is no going back on the N10 million fee for chairmanship contestants in the forthcoming local government council elections.
Many political parties in the state have reported complaining the cost of the nomination forms, threatening to boycott the election.
But the Chairman of the Electoral Commission, Professor Sani Lawan Malumfashi, told newsmen that, “there is no going back on the fixed amounts for the elective positions.”
The Commission recently announced that candidates vying for Chairmanship positions will pay the sum of N10 million to obtain a nomination form while candidates contesting for Councilorship positions will have to pay N5 million for their nomination forms on or before October 18th, 2024.
Professor Sani Lawan Malumfashi claimed the Commission wants to be assertive without undue relying on the government, “and we have already taken an independent decision on the matter,” he added.
“There is no going back on the amount earlier announced.”
He said, “We are not going to change or reduce it, there is no going back. It’s already in our guidelines and already a law to us.
It is not about encouraging money politics, everything is not the way it is now. We are also going to spend huge amounts, the materials and everything we are going to use must cost money so we are going to bear the cost too.”
“It may surprise you to know that those complaining bitterly are the officials of the NNPP party, the ruling party. We said very clearly, in view of the inflation rate in this country, it has affected virtually everything because nothing in the market is free now.”
He added that the Commission has taken into cognisance the population of voters in Kano which is over six million and election materials must be sufficient for them on the election day.
He said, “Kano State is one state equal to three with 44 LGA’S, 484 wards, 11022 polling units, over 6 million voters and we are recruiting over thirty thousand ad-hoc staff and we are claiming independent, if we are dependent on the government, tell me how independent we are going to be.” Malumfashi asked.
The Kano Electoral body had set October 1st as the date for the commencement of sales of forms and October 18th as the date for submission of all completed forms
