News

Senate President advocates civic education against vote selling, vote buying

Published

2 years ago

December 1, 2022

Senate President Ahmad Lawan

The President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan has advocated the institution of civic education in school curriculum to highlight the evils in vote selling and vote buying at elections and discourage citizens from engaging in them.

Lawan made the remarks when a group known as Polling Unit Ambassadors of Nigeria paid him a visit at the National Assembly on Wednesday.

The leader of the group, Ambassador General Dabas Suleiman told the Senate President that his members were out to sensitize and discourage vote selling and vote buying at elections in the country.

He said they would register their presence in all the polling units across the country to guard against vote selling and vote buying during the forthcoming polls.

Responding, the Senate President said: “How I wish everybody can be an ambassador against vote buying or selling. To be a polling unit ambassador is something that you have decided because you think the present situation is not good enough.

“People sell their votes and people buy votes during elections. For those that sell, I think we need to enlighten them, educate them. That your vote is your liberty. That your vote is your freedom. Your vote is your education. Your vote is your health.

“In fact, your vote is your life in a democracy. And if you sell it, it is like you are mortgaging your education, your life because of pittance. So we need to educate those who sell their votes.

“Election environment is like a market because you cannot have a vote to sell if you don’t have a buyer. And the crime is evil. The vote buyer identifies those who are willing to sell and infact, left to me, I think the vote buyer is even more criminals than the vote sellers especially in Nigerian case because most people who sell their votes are voters who hardly understand the implications of what they are doing.

“Those who are enlightened hardly sell their votes and therefore people take advantage of those who are poor, who are not sufficiently educated or not educated at all, who live in rural areas and so on and so forth.

“In the 2022 Electoral Act that the National Assembly amended and signed by Mr President, vote buying and vote selling are punishable. And we have made the sanction very stiff because we have to discourage people from selling their votes or people from buying votes.

“But I also believe that we don’t have to wait until somebody buys vote or sells vote and then you prosecute such person. We need to educate people right from, maybe primary school. Where is our Civic education. Citizens should grow up to know that vote buying or vote selling is criminal.

“We need to work on both fronts. While we arrest and prosecute those that are involved in vote buying and selling, we should also ensure education like you are doing now, going round to say this is bad, this is wrong.

“But we should institute it in our curriculum so that right from childhood, primary school, secondary school, people know that once you reach voting age, that your vote can make a difference in your life and don’t joke with it.

“So we have to do a lot more in terms of how we deal with the situation because stopping it at the polling station is like you are waiting for something to happen and therefore, at that point, you are simply reacting.

“But if we start educating our youths, our children right from basic education, it is like everybody will turn to a polling unit ambassador because everybody would have known the disadvantage of selling votes or the evil of buying votes.”

News

Bill To End HND, BSc Dichotomy Scales Second Reading In The House

Published

2 days ago

March 5, 2025

News Editor

A bill to abolish the dichotomy and discrimination between Bachelor’s Degree holders and Higher National Diploma (HND) holders has scaled second reading in the House of Representatives.

According to the Speaker, Tajudeen Abbas, the bill sought to replace HND with Bachelor of Tech so that graduates of polytechnic would be able to compete favourably with other university graduates.

The bill, which was sponsored by a member, Fuad Laguda from Lagos State, also emphasised the importance of technical education.

Speaker Abbas said the position taken by all boards of polytechnics in Nigeria is “the abolition of HND and in place of it to have Bachelor of Technology so that at least graduates of polytechnics will be able to compete with those from universities”.

“At the same time, they are calling for hybrid supervision where the degree component of the polytechnic education will be handled by the NUC (National Universities Commission) while the national diploma will continue to be handled by the NBTE (National Board for Technical Education).

“Because of the degree component of this amendment, they felt that the qualification for being rector should also be upgraded to a Ph.D holder at the minimum since you will now be talking about degree programmes, it is only proper for such kind of establishment to have a Ph.D holder as the head of the institution,” he said.

Abbas subjected the bill to a voice vote and the lawmakers approved it to scale second reading.

News

Tax Reform Bills: Senate To Consider Viable Opinions Of Stakeholders

Published

1 week ago

February 25, 2025

News Editor

Nigerian-Senate

The chairman, Senate committee on Finance, Senator Sani Musa, says the Senate will consider viable opinions of all stakeholders in the passage of current Tax Reform Bills .

Senator Musa who stated this during an interview with newsmen in Abuja emphasized the need for Nigerians to be patient for a tax regime that would be beneficial to all and sundry.

He explained that the red chamber would evolve a legislation that is workable in line with international best practices.

Senator Musa told newsmen that president TINUBU needs one trillion dollar economy adding that the proposed Tax regime would outlive every individual including the lawmakers.

News

Price Hike: FCCPC Summons MultiChoice, Warns Against Exploitation

Published

1 week ago

February 25, 2025

News Editor

FCCPC

The Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) has summoned MultiChoice Nigeria to explain its proposed subscription price increase, set to take effect on March 1, 2025.

Exercising its mandate under Sections 32 and 33 of the FCCPA, the FCCPC directed the Chief Executive Officer of MultiChoice Nigeria to attend an investigative hearing at the Commission’s headquarters on Thursday, February 27, 2025.

In a statement, the Director of Corporate Affairs in FCCPC, Mr Ondaje Ijagwu said the action follows MultiChoice’s formal notification of the price adjustment, which raises concerns about recurrent unilateral price hikes, potential market dominance abuse, and perceived anti-competitive practices in the pay-TV industry.

“The FCCPC is deeply concerned that Nigerian consumers continue to face frequent price increases, amid accusations that MultiChoice applies different pricing strategies in other markets, heightening questions about fairness and market abuse and should MultiChoice fail to provide satisfactory explanations or be found in violation of fair market principles, the FCCPC will be left left with no other option than to impose regulatory penalties, sanctions, or other corrective measures to protect Nigerian consumers” He warned

In his words”Furthermore, the FCCPC is engaging the sector regulator and other relevant agencies to ensure fair competition and consumer protection within Nigeria’s broadcasting and digital subscription landscape”.