The Senate on Wednesday confirmed Ayobami Salami, a professor and pioneer vice-chancellor of the Oyo state owned First Technical University, Tech-U, Ibadan, has been confirmed as resident electoral commisioner.
Mutiu Agboke, a lawyer and doctor of philosophy, who was REC in Oyo, was also confirmed. He hails from Ogun State.
Though the duo has not been assigned any state, they were confirmed alongside 17 others whose names were sent by the Muhammadu Buhari, Nigeria’s president.
The nominees who were confirmed are Ibrahim Abdullahi (Adamawa); Obo Effanga (Cross River); Umar Ibrahim (Taraba); Samuel Egwu (Kogi), Onyeka Ugochi (Imo) and Muhammad Bashir (Sokoto).
Others are Zango Abdu (Katsina); Queen Agwu (Ebonyi), Agundu Tersoo (Benue); Yomere Oritsemlebi (Delta); Yahaya Ibrahim, (Kaduna); Nura Ali (Kano); Agu Uchenna (Enugu); Ahmed Garki (FCT); Hudu Yunusa (Bauchi); Uzochukwu Chijioke, (Anambra) and Mohammed Nura (Yobe).
The Senate Committee on the Independent National Electoral Commission chaired by Senator Kabiru Gaya (APC Kano South) had, last week, screened the nominees behind closed doors.
Presenting his report to the Senate, Gaya said, “To determine their suitability for the positions which they were nominated, nominees were asked questions that bothered mostly on partisanship, membership of political parties, and how they hoped to improve the electoral process if and when their nominations for appointments are confirmed.”
The nominees, Gaya said, assured the committee of their non-partisanship, non-membership of any political party, and promised to discharge their responsibilities diligently according to the laid down laws.
He said the committee found no merit in the petitions against four nominees that bordered on alleged membership of political parties, partisanship, compromise and incompetence.
“The committee did due diligence on the petitions by listening to the defence of the nominees and carrying out a detailed examination of the petitions to determine the validity or otherwise of the allegations against the four nominees,” Gaya said.
