Nigeria: INEC Election Guidelines - Critical Information

Accreditation concludes at 12 Noon

The guidelines [1] for the Nigerian elections in April 2011 have been published and these are the most important points to note by all Nigerians and accredited monitors of the elections.

All eligible voters need to be accredited before they can vote. Accreditation takes place between 8:00AM and 12 noon, anyone not accredited within that timeframe will NOT be able to vote on that Election Day.

Once a voter is accredited, the index finger of his/her left hand will be marked with indelible ink.

Voting commences at 12:30

Voting commences from 12:30 in the afternoon and ends when the last accredited person has voted. No additional accreditation can occur after 12 noon or if voting ends early.

At the end of accreditation, all officials are introduced. Next all accredited voters will queue up in one single line. Where tradition does not allow men and women to mingle in a queue, there will be separate queues for men and women.

All accredited voters are then counted and the number is announced loudly to the hearing of all assembled.

Note: This is presents one opportunity to relay this information to the ReVoDa system [2].

After having the transparent ballot box displayed to all assembled, the accredited voters can approach the presiding office one at a time and obtain a signed, stamped and dated ballot paper.

The accredited voter then moves to the cubicle, thumbprints the space opposite the symbol of the party of his/her choice and then drops the ballot paper in the ballot box, in the full view of all present.

The visible audible count

Once all accredited voters have voted, the count can commence.

The contents of the ballot box are emptied on the table and the ballot papers are sorted according to party symbols then in alphabetical order the ballots are called out and counted with the results of the count announced to the hearing of all assembled.

If the number of votes counted exceeds the number of accredited voters at that polling unit and after thorough verification it remains the case, the results for that polling unit will be nullified and duly announced and published as such.

The facts must go up the chain

The collation chain then moves up the system through the Collation Officer at the Registration Area Center, to the Local Government Area level and then to the State level all monitored by approved party agents, security agents and accredited monitoring agents.

For these elections to be free, fair, transparent, honest and devoid of malevolent influence all Nigerians need to be alert, vigilant, smart and ready to ensure that they votes count and most importantly ensure that no situation arises that would lead to having the votes at your polling unit nullified.

Sources and references

[1] INEC guidelines for the general elections in April 2011

[2] ReVoDa | How it works – Protecting your vote

Nigeria: ReVoDa - Making Your Votes Count

Nigeria: A Primer on INEC Elections in April 2011

Always read the Nigerian #INECRegistration BiDaily for Nigerian and electoral issues.

Nigeria: A Primer on INEC Elections in April 2011

Results and Reviews

Update: Nigeria: INEC Election Guidelines - Critical Information

This blog has been a veritable resource and guide to the Nigerian elections in April 2011, I have consistently updated this blog and add other bits of information as the election season wound down bringing together the election reviews and results from various sources.

All outstanding elections have now been concluded and those with grievances are now at liberty to file their claims with the election tribunals to seek redress or resolution.

The INEC Nigeria homepage offers a summary of the validated results of the elections.

Punch on the Web: Election Portal | Results of 2011 Presidential and other elections

Home : Nigeria Election Coalition presents an another analysis of the results announced.

The provisions for electoral petitions

The Electoral Act 2010 provides for the resolution of electoral petitions, these can be found in PART VIII - DETERMINATION OF ELECTION PETITIONS ARISING FROM ELECTIONS this starts from Section 133 or Page 45 according to the pagination of the PDF file.

Electoral Act 2010 as gazetted [PDF File].

Petitions should be filed within 21 days of the declaration of the results, the tribunal should deliver its judgement within 180 days of the filing of that petition and appeals for the tribunal process must be exhausted with 90 days of the judgement.

Election petitions take precedence over all other case files before the tribunal or court according to Section 142 of this Act.

No hard time-limits are placed on the complete resolution of petitions all the way to the Supreme Court if necessary.

Election Reviews

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review I

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review II - New Election Dates

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review III - Who votes on Saturday.

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review IV - Part I to Voting

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review IV - Part II - We can

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review V

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review VI - Report to Prevent Rigging

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review VII - Change!

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review VIII - A President-Elect

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review IX - Analysing the Presidential Results

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review X - The North

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review XI - A functioning democracy?

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review XII - Altogether acceptable

Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review XIII - Ideas for Electoral Reform

The election timetables, postponements and rescheduling

This primer started as a collation of information bits posted by the @INECNigeria Twitter Account, it has been regularly updated to reflect changes during the April 2011 election season though the most of the original parts of this posting appear below.

New election dates announced on the 3rd of April, 2011, further postponements announced on the 7th of April, 2011 for certain Senatorial Districts and Federal Constituencies

National Assembly Elections - Saturday, 9th of April, 2011 (15 Senators and 48 Representatives will not be elected on this day.)

Visit Nigeria: #NigeriaDecides Election Review III - Who votes on Saturday for more information.

Presidential Elections - Saturday, 16th of April, 2011

Gubernatorial and State Legislature Elections - Tuesday, 26th of April, 2011 (The Senators and Representatives not scheduled for election on the 9th of April will be elected on this day.)

Rescheduled Gubernatorial and State Legislature Elections - Thursday, 28th of April, 2011 (For Kaduna State & Bauchi States because of security reasons borne of post-election violence after the Presidential Elections.)

Supplemental elections held in 4 local government areas and one ward in Imo State to resolved the inconclusive situation – Friday, 6th of May, 2011.

INEC engaging social media

The @inecnigeria Twitter account finally came alive with activity last week with useful information about the elections to be conducted in Nigeria in the month of April 2011.

Through the series of tweets posted and my comments this blog will attempt to give a general idea of what to expect during those elections.

@inecnigeria At INEC, we are working round the clock to ensure a smooth delivery of a free and fair election to the people of Nigeria.

@inecnigeria INEC is doing its best as an Election Management Body (EMB) to restore confidence and provide a level playing field in Nigeria.

We as Nigerians expect no less from the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) it is our hope that the elections are conducted and results announced that reflect the express wishes and majority voice of Nigeria.

@inecnigeria The total number of registered voters stands at 73,528,040 while total number of duplicates stands at 870,612. #VotersRegFacts.

The Timetable [Source]

The National Assembly Elections will hold on Saturday, the 9^th of April, 2011. This pertains to the Nigerian Senate and the House of Representatives that meet in the Federal Capital Territory of Abuja unfortunately, the listed URL on the INEC Nigeria website does not link to the lists. [The URLs are now working.]

@inecnigeria List of candidates for Nigerian Senate elections http://j.mp/gpUxQm

@inecNigeria List of candidates contesting for the Nigerian House of Representatives http://j.mp/dO1xYf

The Presidential elections will hold on Saturday, the 16^th of April, 2011. The list of presidential office aspirants can be found here.

@Inecnigeria The list of candidates contesting for presidency with their running mates http://j.mp/glXuws

The gubernatorial and state house of assembly elections will hold on Tuesday, the 26^th of April, 2011.

@inecnigeria List of candidates contesting the Nigerian gubernatorial elections http://j.mp/effx3Q

At the writing of this blog the list for those running for State Houses of Assembly was not yet available but I will make that available as soon as I can.

Movement restrictions on voting day

In order to ensure that the voting in 2011 is seen as free and fair, it is probably going to be a full day exercise with full voter participation but a number of things need to be known.

Movement will be very restricted on election days which means voters must be close to locations where they registered to be able to vote. Students who registered at their schools would have to be in residence to vote at those locations and those who travelled to their villages from their locations of residence to register would have to make certain that they are back in their villages for voting before election days.

@inecnigeria It is important to reiterate that movement during elections will be restricted to only those on official election duty.

@inecnigeria Voters are therefore advised to start their day (on election days) close to their polling units to avoid being disenfranchised.

@inecnigeria #INEC. Governors and other officials not allowed to move around with armed detail on election day.

@inecnigeria Governors, other public office holders have been advised to come, vote and go back home. No reason for "monitoring". #INEC

@inecnigeria Movement restrictions will be enforced by security agencies nationwide for public safety & to preserve integrity of election materials.

Monitoring is now part of our civic responsibility Nigeria: ReVoDa - Making Your Votes Count

Protocols for elections

There is an accreditation process and a voting process on the day of the elections. Voters are to arrive at 8:00AM at their respective polling units to be accredited and this continues until 12 noon prompt.

It is the most important part of the electioneering process because it validates the eligibility of the voter to vote and this I believe is verifying registration, identification and the matching fingerprints.

@inecnigeria Voters must be at their respective polling booth at 8am for accreditation. Accreditation is a prerequisite for voting.

@inecnigeria Accreditation begins at 8am and ends at 12 noon prompt. It is the most important process in voting during the elections.

The voting would be by Modified Open Ballot System [1] the guidelines for this process will be published on the 23^rd of March, 2011.

@inecnigeria Voting procedure will be 'Open Ballot System' (similar to what was used during 1993 elections)

@inecnigeria Proper guidelines for the elections will be released this Wednesday. #INEC.

Protecting your votes

Voters will be allowed to wait around after voting to ensure their votes are counted and tallied freely, fairly, transparently and without interference. They are allowed to take their mobile phones into polling units, record events and make use of the ReVoDa [2] monitoring process.

No one in political office or contesting elections is allowed to monitor elections, they are to vote and leave the environs of the polling units.

The list of accredited election monitors appears here [3].

@inecnigeria Voters are allowed to bring in mobile phones/devices into Polling Units. #INEC.

@inecnigeria Violence and disruptions at polling units could be grounds to nullify results in those polling units. #INEC

@inecnigeria Results will be nullified if the total votes cast exceed the total number of accredited voters.

@inecnigeria There is a profound commitment from overwhelming majority of Nigerians for free and fair and credible elections in April. #INEC

Most of the information about the conduct of elections, the candidates and guidelines can be found on this page [4].

Little frustrations

Trawling through the INEC Nigeria website is a nightmare, the placing of information is not consistent, the quality of data is badly processed with some information that should be in tables provided as downloadable files in some cases you have to rely on the pot-luck of the latest news column of 3 items to get the information required because the user experience is appallingly unprofessional.

I was frustrated when I started writing this blog hours ago that I stopped, but this not before I had posted some rather scathing remarks about the website. I can now report that amazing improvements have been made to get at the necessary detail in use on this blog.

After the elections on the 16^th of April the INEC Nigeria website was again revamped making results even more accessible, the organisation has consistently improved on the quality of their service and information dissemination.

Sources

[1] National Mirror - INEC adopts modified open ballot system.

[2] ReVoDa: making voting social and protecting your democracy

[3] Accredited Domestic Observer Groups/Organisations for the 2011 April General Elections

[4] Reports: INEC Nigeria

Nigeria: Know your inalienable voter’s rights

Hospital Date Six

Preparations and getting out

Being much too much of a night person you find that making early morning appointments literally upend your scheduling as you fret and fidget about being fresh and ready for the day.

I had planned two meetings one after the other with the hope of squeezing in two unscheduled ones with my treatment advisor and the pastor at the hospital.

These days, it is better to crowd out the day than spread out the opportunities for interaction into many days.

With that introduction you probably have noticed that it was my 6^th quarterly meeting with my medical consultant and we were scheduled to meet at 9:05AM.

With not much sleep had, the alarm went off at 8:00 not that I was asleep at that time, but I did feel like I should be asleep. Getting up, I cleaned up, ironed a shirt, dressed up and made for the hospital by bicycle, arriving at 9:08AM.

Tipping the scales too high

I was called soon afterwards to have my weight and blood pressure measurements taken, I stepped on the scales and as the digital figures came up, I had to cover my eyes; another 4 kilograms since the last time, it must be my shoes – Not good.

My blood pressure was normal and noted for me to present to my consultant when we meet. I did not have to wait another 5 minutes when he came out to get me warning me that he had an intern as usual – I told him, I am not bothered, I am quite glad that my health and its progress excites enough interest to make it a subject of study.

We shook hands and I took a seat as we began to chat about things in general, the work situation, my health and state of mind, how I feel about things and so on, before we returned to the business of the day. I produced the slip of paper with my weight and blood pressure measurements to which he opined that the weight is good as long as I do not add another 6 kilograms.

The tales in the blood

My blood test results were looking really good, the indicators were a lot better than in December and more importantly we had exceeded a long awaited threshold with regards to my immunity.

That was welcome and uplifting news, I felt quite warm on the inside about that as we discussed the subject of Vitamin D and the Dutch saying that children take supplements to help their bones grow strong in months with an R.

I said, the best thing he could have done for me was send me on holiday to the sun as a prescription to which he replied there will be queues at his door with people looking for a similar prescription.

He thanked me for the present I gave him at Christmas, wished me well and we made a new appointment to meet in just over 3 months.

Other matters

I got the nurse to print out my last 3 test results which had a section saying the number be multiplied by 1.21 for blacks (negroide in Dutch) – a research thing I have to do.

Meeting my treatment consultant I asked for recommendations of Yoga classes and possibly some physiotherapy for my weaker leg. She saw through me thinking the physiotherapy would be better, but that is harder work but in any case we’ll try Yoga first.

I then got to see the Pastor just as they were breaking up a meeting of inter-faith counsellors of the hospital – the conversation was light, interesting and allowed for me to get a few things off my chest.

That just prepared me for the next meeting down the road to see a work coach to talk about issues for employment, assistance and advice.

More to come as the day goes by.

Thought Picnic: Civil Laws Always Trump Personal Beliefs

Another one of those things

Every once in a while, I dare to stick my toe in the barracuda infested waters of Nigeria discourse and commentary outside the haunts that I am more comfortable with when it comes to addressing social issues.

I cannot understand how it always ends up looking like a battle field where the fundamentally religious is pitched against the norms of civil society and reason is in danger of being suffocated and derived of the oxygen of tolerance.

Reneging on a contract for religious reasons

It started off on Facebook, with the following status:

A Canadian florist refused to provide flowers for a wedding after she found out that the couple was same-sex. Kim Evans, of Petals and Promises Wedding Flowers, reportedly agreed to sell flowers to the couple, but then backed out when she learned they were gay, citing her Christian faith. The couple was not identified, but their wedding planner said the florist's rebuff was "going to stay with them for years. [Link to Source – Facebook membership might be required.] The original news story is found here [1].

I will concentrate more on my views than that of others but suffice it to say that the moment someone applauded the act of Kim Evans and I raised issues about the wrongness of her act it developed into the well-trotted scriptures about sin, sinners, homosexuals, Christianity, the Levitical laws and much more.

This blog fleshes out the opinions I shared and the direction in which I had hope to steer the discourse.

The test for faith, hope and love

I like the way she has cited her Christian faith which probably is a valid excuse considering the circumstances, but that is a very personal if not a selfish thing. If she cited her Christian hope, she cannot have hoped to win her customers over to her kind of thinking by her actions it would read as being outrageously wicked to mar the couple’s happy day just because it did not correlate with her beliefs.

No matter how one dares to stretch the imagination there is not a smidgen of Christian love to see because love is tender, love is kind and does not create offence, her only refuge could be her faith because love has a selflessness that demands a lot of Christians when dealing with the world at large.

The “infidels” had entered a contractual agreement with her company out of good faith and just to give context to the matters of faith, hope and charity (love), there is a Bible verse [2] that states; “Three things will last forever--faith, hope, and love--and the greatest of these is love”. She probably passed the test of faith, one can only wonder what she hoped for but she definitely failed the test of love.

I went on to wonder how this looks for people looking at the broader issue of Christians who cannot be trusted to follow through on agreed contracts because their intolerance and bigotry (my view was that the withdrawal of business on the basis of religious belief was an outward display of prejudice) gets in the way of them ministering love that might work winning these people to the truth.

And I concluded, she was wrong!

A lack of comprehension

A number of comments followed from the idea that there was no prejudice in the lady’s actions to the fundamentalist homophobia seeking refuge in scriptural superfluity until someone interjected to bring a sense of frail humanity into focus but sides had been taken and some were already implacably entrenched.

I followed taking this reasoned support by identifying the gulf that had developed in educational standards in Nigeria where we are allowed the latitude of critical thinking and contextual analysis of issues which helped our comprehension of matters and the allusion that Nuhu Ribadu made on the presidential debates last Friday that Nigerian education is in tatters.

That sadly illustrates the fact that many with whom we engage are unable to accommodate different perspectives to an issue once they have found something they are familiar with to sink their teeth into.

Whilst they might well be able to reel off quotes and verses they very rarely find ways put such into context that exposes any critical thinking ability or logical process such that everything is literal and the figurative is too abstract to appreciate and as the assumed discourse develops contrived analogies are lumped in that it might just take a treatise to unravel the jumble that makes for the flawed thought process.

When you engage

It then get very easy to digress and concentrate on the subjective and sentimental without addressing the core issue which is personal beliefs are personal and private and not one is stopped from having such beliefs but when such a person has to interact with the public like running a business there are civil laws that have precedence over those belief systems allowing for a level playing field of clear communication and protection from prejudice and discrimination by reason of civil laws.

Like one religious person did say in the news story, “The shopkeeper has every right to her own convictions as long as she is a private citizen in her own house, but if she opens her doors to sell flowers, then she must be prepared to meet and deal with the public.”

This is the dilemma many religious people face their inability to appreciate the boundaries of their religious beliefs in the context of the society that they have to deal with. One option is for such people to assemble and reside in religious ghettos, separate from an influence and situation that would make their beliefs a subject of societal scrutiny.

The state ranks above personal beliefs

Recently, we have had cases of the religious beliefs conflicting with the sense of duty where people paid to provide a public service allow their prejudices to decline serving sections of society with different moral values or belief systems or they feel their religious laws are superior to the state and civil laws.

That situation is untenable and presents opportunities for a chaotic society if everyone believed themselves outside the ambit of civil laws that do not agree with their faiths.

The bigger lesson is found in the admonition or rather the advice to [2], “Render therefore unto Caesar the things which be Caesar's, and unto God the things which be God's.”

This is one case where Caesar and God are confused in roles and service, when they are supposed to be separate spheres of operation, and what we know as the separation of state and religion or more particularly, the separation of personal belief systems from how we interact in the public space.

Sources

[1] Florist refuses to outfit same-sex couple's wedding - New Brunswick - CBC News

[2] 1 Corinthians 13:13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. NLT

[3] Luke 20:25 "Caesar's," they replied. He said to them, "Then give to Caesar what is Caesar's, and to God what is God's." KJV

Related blogs

Nigeria: Senator's defiance makes Sharia Law untenable

The case for State law over religious guidance

Nigeria/The UK: The issue of child slavery by trusted guardians

Guardian abuse

The news [1] about the jailing of a female Nigerian-born church pastor in the UK for child trafficking and slavery is a microcosm of the abuse of guardian-ward relationships that long predates my birth.

Usually, a person of certain privilege or opportunity informs relations that their children would under their care have access to opportunity and a better life beyond that which the parents of those children can offer and in the process have the right of guardianship transferred to the benefactor on trust.

Good and bad guardianship

Taking the example of my parents, my father got to stay with his great-uncle who was a mentor that offered every opportunity for my father to succeed, by encouragement, by inspiration and by challenge – he went on to be a successful accountant and I have seen lots of correspondence between them that shows the amazingly mutual respect they had for each other.

In the case of my mother, she stayed with a first-cousin once removed on her maternal lineage who being a school master with an apparently evil wife meted out unbelievable cruelty to my mother than the stories we heard made the hairs on the backs of our necks stand on end.

Alone with the scars

Being far from home, there was no one to deliver her from the abuse she suffered apart from a neighbour who after enduring much of the anguish and cries of the child tried to intervene. However, the guardians got away with almost anything and made to justify their cruelty with notions of discipline or imparting the benefits of industry in the child.

After my mother left their guardianship, she rarely ever kept contact with any of that family but I was taken aback when he died and my mother was so distraught that she did not make it soon enough to witness his funeral.

Beneath it all, there is was a form of gratitude I could not appreciate but for all the scars my mother bore I am grateful that she did not in turn project that onto others.

Our dread of religious figures

Back to the general issue, this pastor and thereby a religious figure would have offered by reason of her vocation references that we fear to check all due to our cultural dread of the supernatural with regards to people of the cloth or some sort of religious calling. We have the feeling that religious people have the power to call down fire or have the earth open up to swallow us up at command that we rationalise with the irrationality of not touching God’s anointed regardless of character.

A religious person is a self-notarised person who can vouch on their own recognisance that we seek no other references as to their responsibility, honesty, humanity, compassion, competence and ability to do what they profess to be able to do.

That provided one of the elements of trust that allowed the parents of the two children affected by this case to allow this wicked person to take on these children as dependants.

The false Utopia of being abroad

Beyond this, the notion that the benefactor was in the UK beclouded the necessity to check what the benefactor was really doing in the UK. Somehow, to the person in the village and dare I say to many resident in Nigeria, a UK resident and broadly anyone abroad is a person of means, a person of influence and a person under whose mentorship one obtains a fast-track to opportunity and success.

The fact was this pastor was an illegal immigrant in the UK, who had a false passport and had provided false passports for her children and the wards she brought over from Nigeria.

The wards once on UK soil never saw the opportunities that were promised them rather they were engaged as slave labour to serve the whims and sadistic caprices of their presumed benefactor.

Escaping to freedom

No information is given of how long these wards were engaged in slave labour denying them the opportunity to seek out a life of independent borne of honest mentoring but this criminal enterprise came to light when one of the victims escaped the home of her “benefactor” after being physically abused and thankfully this was in the UK where it was unlikely the victim would be sent back to endure her lot and station having received the great privilege of leaving Nigeria for the glorious setting of the UK.

There are other instances of abuse where a young man had been resident as slave for 14 years [2] having arrived in the UK with the promise of getting a university degree but got dumped out on the streets destitute when he rebelled against his treatment.

This kind of ward or dependant abuse I believe is very prevalent in our Nigerian communities, it also extends to African communities where it woman of 47 [3] was brought over from Tanzania and seriously abused.

This problem not only involves those trafficked for slavery abroad but within Nigerian itself from villages or impoverished relations to major cities where the well-off guardians would rather exploit unfortunate distant relations who cannot fight back or complain than employ the house helps they cannot inordinately abuse without sanction.

Core parental responsibility

It is incumbent on parents to ensure that if their children are wards of other guardians, they have ways of ensure that the promises they were given are being fulfilled and there might well be some iota of truth in the conversations they have with their children rather than default to the notion that their children are being workshy.

The best way to elicit such situations is to agree to an innocuous code word that would indicate suspicious activity and they should not take everything on trust from those they have devolved the responsibility of parenthood too.

There are no easy answers to dealing with the abuse of wards and dependants but we need people to know that sending their children away on trust could be fraught with dangers they will never learn of, it is still the responsibility of a parent to ensure that the promise of a bright future is not paved with an absurdly tortuous present.

May I use this opportunity to introduce AFRUCA - Africans Unite Against Child Abuse (UK)[4] an organisation that deals with issues of the abuse of African children and offers a service to deliver children from slave bondage who have been brought to the UK under false pretences.

Source

[1] BBC News | Pastor jailed for trafficking African child 'slaves'

[2] BBC News | Tales of slavery in modern London

[3] BBC News | Harrow woman convicted of keeping Tanzanian as slave

[4] AFRUCA - Africans Unite Against Child Abuse (UK)

Nigeria: Responding to Dan Primack's Atrocious Stereotype

Also previously published at NigeriansTalk.org with the same title.

Taking the hatchet to the hack

Very little upsets me but what cannot be countenanced is mediocrity masquerading as professionalism where clichés are allowed to get in the way of expected originality and the package does not contain what it says on the box.

In that sense you realise you have been scammed, swindled, defrauded and outwitted by a hoodlum, you could forgive yourself for being that silly but hoodlums with pens writing for popular magazines are dangerous and outrageously atrocious at best.

In my Twitter timeline I came across a number of exchanges that pertained to the pejorative use of Nigerian with the word Scam and a version 2.0 as if it was describing a more sophisticated scam that had emerged out of Nigeria and had been noticed by a hack writing for the National Enquirer or some sensationalist village rag until my search found that he wrote for Fortune.com.

The label and contents differ

There is definitely no reason for me to read Dan Primack’s Term Sheet apart from probably to redline it and award a fail but this perked my interest, Nigerian scam 2.0: Would you like to buy some Facebook shares? [1] and naturally, it was worth reading up on because I have written a few blogs on how social engineering is used to scam people.

Beyond the title, I could find nothing within the text of the published material that referred to Nigeria; in fact, it was in the comments that followed that the author tried to project a rotten stereotype that would make similar rotten and lazy epithets as Muslim Terrorists or Gay Paedophile sound tame.

We know Muslims in general are not terrorists and probably on a larger scale terrorist is a broader global thing hardly defined by religion, just as paedophiles are not necessarily gay and it probably covers all sexualities of adults abusing children – in the same vein, whilst scams might have come out of Nigeria, most scams are hardly Nigerian in origin despite the unfair slant of the media in castigating groups for the benefit of the subjective and sensational.

Link to link, story to story

The hack referenced two articles in his absurd copy, an Investor Alert [2] send out by the SEC and a Judgement Order [3] in favour of the SEC.

This little piece of analysis lead me down a rabbit’s warren of more references related to something completely contrary to the title and not one mention of Nigeria in the following articles.

Randy M. Cho according to the judgement order had been at his pre-IPO scamming business since 2001 where he had fleeced “at least $3.7 million from at least 45 investors in four states.” For the record, the states are geographical entities within the United States of America and these were about “expected initial public offerings of those companies, including Centerpoint, AOL/Time Warner, Inc., Google, Inc., Facebook, Inc. and Rosetta Stone, Inc.”

Searching for the remotest Nigerian

In the Investor Alert, we have more URLs that I also reviewed for anything that might remotely refer to Nigeria in the slightest.

FINRA Investor Alert: "Pre-IPO Offerings – These Scammers Are Not Your Friends"

The references are about the judgement obtained against Randy M. Cho whose name bears no resemblance to even uncommon Nigerian names and it even suggests you check the Federal Bureau of Prisons Inmate Locator just in case you are being conned by a criminal but this is within the extents of the United States.

Risky Business: “Pre-IPO” Investing

The helpful authorities then offered an example of a pre-IPO scam featuring a McWhortle Enterprises, Inc. which is based in the large premises of a private mail bag in Washington DC.

For someone who provides “The latest on private equity, M&A, deals and movements — from Wall Street to Silicon Valley”; his byline, one would have expected he would be informative about these scams and at least help people identify if they are being scammed but that would be too much work for a bottom-feeder of yellow journalism whose sensationalist copy sadly belittles those who accept his stuff with any sense of seriousness.

The failure to inform

The links below would have allowed the hack to ascend the steps of mediocrity to a semblance of amateur, it would be effusive praise to suggest professional.

Questions You Should Ask About Your Investments

Internet Fraud

FINRA - FINRA Warns of Facebook-Linked Pre-IPO Scams

How I wish Facebook were a Nigerian company creating such excitement for pre-IPO offerings that make fools part with their money at the sound of something almost too good to be true.

FINRA - Fighting Fraud 101: Smart Tips for Older Investors

Amazingly, even in this well written piece to the seniors, not one mention is made of Nigerians, rather, it simply asks that people note certain traits and characteristics because there are honest Nigerians who are involved in the financial markets, doing a job and helping their clients make good money in a marketplace that is properly regulated by the financial authorities anywhere they might be operating from.

Not anymore

A slight like this must not go unchallenged, only Dan Primack links pre-IPO scams to Nigerians, the Wikipedia reference to Nigerian Scams does not once link this activity to IPOs, the link is tenuous, contrived, lazy, atrocious, stupid and without foundation.

It goes without say that any advice that comes from the likes of Dan Primack should be taken with a pinch of salt or even a spoon of salt and immediately spat out as fantasy presaging possible fraud if he cannot apply himself to expected research and analysis required of people who have a platform like he has.

Nigerians are just not going to roll over and be kicked about by such people anymore; you picked the wrong kind of stereotype to push your irresponsible tripe.

Sources

[1] Nigerian scam 2.0: Would you like to buy some Facebook shares? - The Term Sheet: Fortune's deals blog

[2] Investor Alert: Pre-IPO Investment Scams

[3] Randy M. Cho: SEC v. Randy M. Cho, Civil Action No. 09-CV-6261 (USDC) (N.D.Ill.)

Nigeria: ReVoDa - Making Your Votes Count

Politicians barred from election monitoring

It appears that on Election Day political office holders as was customarily the case will not be able to travel round their constituencies as unauthorised election monitors [1], thereby exerting undue influence on the electoral process.

Many times we have seen these political office holders with their entourages and coterie of the sycophantic mob arrive at voting centres, disrupt the process and at times commandeer the ballot box and get all registrations put in their docket or cart away the ballot box to be stuffed with votes to give them office.

This time, the situation is different and according to the Resident Electoral Commissioner in Oyo State, Mr. Ayo Adakeja, none of the following people can act as party agents during the electoral process - local government chairmen, members of a local government, commissioners in a state, deputy governor, or governor of a state, minister or any other person holding political office under any tier of government.

Besides this, there are vehicular movement restrictions that apply to everyone on election days, this however becomes concerning if people have registered at polling units distant from their locations of residence or those who have registered in their home villages far away from their locations of residence that they cannot make the journey in time to get to vote on election day.

Banking on their impartiality

However, the issue of monitoring of the elections in April 2011 has in essence become a civic responsibility, everyone has to get involved, the employment of members of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) [2] rather than civil servants and teacher who were previously pressganged into service, hopes to use the lack of local allegiance of the NYSC members to offer a façade of impartiality on the part of the agents of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) [3].

NYSC members are usually posted to locations other than their state of origin, a huge responsibility for the future of Nigeria is being placed on their shoulders to ensure that the voting process is transparent, free, fair, unhindered by any vested interests.

Making your votes count through reporting

The civic responsibility part comes with the launching of the ReVoDa [4] application produced by the EiE Nigeria's RSVP campaign [5] which allows for every voter who has a mobile phone to report the state of things at their polling unit.

For the first time, fully corroborated reports of activities at Polling Units can be collated to a central location which would include the Polling Unit Number and the name of the reporter of the event or activity and this should be admissible as part of evidence if electoral disputes should arise.

More importantly, it would hopefully serve as a deterrent to criminal activity since immediate citizen reporting can be done and probably would allow a prompt arresting of the situation before it becomes serious electoral malpractice.

RSVP voting without regrets

Having Registered, we are now going through the process of assessment and Selection of those vying for political office; do not commit or give allegiance until you have heard all sides and had your questions properly answered.

In April, you have the opportunity to Vote for your selections and then you need to take the next step of Protecting your vote to ensure that the popular democratic will of your community, locality, state and country is counted as the ballots indicate.

Download and Use ReVoDa

Avail yourselves of the opportunity of downloading ReVoDa [6] well before the electoral season, visit the site regularly for updates and information about how you too can be involved in ensuring your vote is protected all the way to when the results are announced.

ReVoDa appears very user-friendly with lots of drop-down menus to allow you make your reports of the Election Type, INEC Official, Materials Available, Voting & Accreditation, Votes Collation & Count, Result Announcement, Violence, Fraud and the tally of votes per party.

The democratic process in April 2011 is now squarely in the hands of the people and it is up to us to make it work, however, it can only work if every participates in the debates and discussions, in the voting, in the monitoring and in the reporting truthfully of all activities around the electoral process.

Make Your Vote Count and use all the tools you have to ensure they do count.

Sources

[1] » INEC bars govs, deputies, others from monitoring elections - Vanguard (Nigeria)

[2] National Youth Service Corp

[3] INEC Nigeria

[4] ReVoDa | How it works

[5] Good governance and Public accountability: EnoughisEnough Nigeria (EiE)

[6] Enough is Enough (EiE) Nigeria : ReVoDa – How to download the application