The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has notified the suspended Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan about the receipt of a petition to recall her from the National Assembly.
The commission disclosed this in a statement issued by Sam Olumekun, INEC National Commissioner and Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee, on Wednesday in Abuja.
Olumekun also confirmed that, in addition to the statement issued by INEC on Tuesday, the commission had received the contact addresses of representatives of the petitioners seeking to recall Natasha.
He stated that the telephone numbers and e-mail addresses of the petitioners' representatives had been provided to INEC in a letter dated March 26 addressed to the chairman of the commission.
“As provided in Clause 2(a) of the commission’s Regulations and Guidelines for Recall 2024, a letter has been written to notify the senator sought to be recalled about the receipt of the petition and delivered to her official address.
“The same letter has been copied to the presiding officer of the Senate and published on the commission’s website.
“The next step is to scrutinise the list of signatories submitted by the petitioners to ascertain that the petition is signed by more than half (over 50 per cent) of the registered voters in the constituency.
“This will be done in the coming days. The outcome, which will be made public, shall determine the next step to be taken by the commission,’’ he said.
Olumekun reassured Nigerians that the recall process would be open and transparent.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that a group of registered voters from Kogi Central Senatorial District submitted a petition to INEC on Monday, urging the commission to commence the recall process of Akpoti-Uduaghan, the Senator representing the senatorial district.
The constituents, in the letter signed by the Lead Petitioner, Salihu Habib, and submitted at INEC headquarters, Abuja, on Monday, said they no longer had confidence in Akpoti-Uduaghan as their senator and representative in the National Assembly.
Meanwhile, INEC confirmed on Tuesday the receipt of the petition, accompanied by six bags of documents said to contain signatures collected from more than half of the 474,554 registered voters in the senatorial district.
Olumekun said in a statement that the figure was said to have spread across 902 polling units in 57 registration areas (wards) in the five local government areas of Adavi, Ajaokuta, Ogori/Magongo, Okehi and Okene.
He assured Nigerians that the commission would follow its legal framework in treating the recall petition.
Olumekum, however, said that the commission’s immediate observation was that the petitioners' representatives did not provide their contacts in the petition's covering letter.
He said these included their addresses, telephone numbers and e-mail addresses through which they could be contacted, as provided in Clause 1(f) of the commission’s regulations and guidelines.
“The address given was “Okene, Kogi State”, which is not a definite location for contacting the petitioners.
“Only the telephone number of 'the lead petitioner' is provided, as against the numbers of all the other representatives of the petitioners,” Olumekun had said.