Shame to lawyers: NBA election a fraud, says aspirant
By Dupe Alao
One of the Presidential aspirant in the Saturday Nigerian Bar Association, (NBA) election has described the exercise as a huge fraud.
The Dele Adesina Support Group, in a statement on Saturday said the outcome of the election will not reflect the will of majority of NBA members.
It demanded for the immediate suspension of the election process to a later date
“when a clean list must have been prepared and published. The ongoing process is
discredited and does not represent the dignity of our most honourable profession.”
The group in a statement made available to Irohinoodua and signed by its National Coordinator, Adesina Adegnite said
“we write to express our displeasure
over the process and conduct of the NBA Election 2020.
The ongoing Election which generated a lot of interest, within and without
Nigeria has brought another bad testament to the legal profession in our dear
country.”
The group said in the build up to the election, the Electoral Committee of the Nigerian
Bar Association (ECNBA) and the leadership of the bar had promised a free, fair,
and credible election that will change the narrative of the recent electoral
experience of the group.
“Our ICT Consultants have further informed us that though the voting site
ostensibly appears credible on the surface, it is apparent that the data uploaded to
the site was programmed and preconfigured to achieve a desired result in an
obvious case of data diddling. Consequently, we have every cause to query the
data uploaded on the voting platform as same appear to have imprint of a
manipulated poll. Several members of some Branches where our candidate enjoys
huge support including, Ikeja Branch, Ibadan Branch, Enugu Branch, Ilorin
Branch did not receive voting links for election” the group said.
The group said none of aspirants was given an opportunity to interrogate
the voting portal prior to the election.
“Surprisingly, the final voters list which was
released about 5 hours to the commencement of the poll contrary to the provision
of the NBA Constitution (2015) as amended, which provided that same shall be
released not later than 28days before the election, contained the names of at least
86 persons alleged to be members of International Diaspora.”
The group wondered when
the NBA established an International Diaspora Branch.
It said that there were also over
4000 names without branches linked to them.
“Several Branches had names of their members
uncaptured while several strange names were wrongly added to the list of some
other Branches.”
Other infractions listed are padding of voters’ list of some Branches, and reduction in the number of
published voters’ list of others an example being Obollo-Afor Branch which
has over 661 names on the voters list when the actual voters list is less than
60, several branches had names of hitherto eligible voters removed from the
final list while several members had their names listed in branches other than theirs.
It said that many members have reported that they received notification of
confirmation of voting when they neither received voting links nor voted.
“From the foregoing, there is no doubt that the ongoing NBA Election lacks all
features of credibility and transparency.”