Elections Postponed - Jega Announces New Dates

Prof. Attahiru Jega has just briefed the media on the outcome of all the meetings held earlier today to decide the best dates to hold elections. Jega held briefings with various stakeholders including all the political parties, security agencies, civil society and the media.

The INEC chairman said 26 out of the 28 registered political parties were at the meetings, and with their agreement, the 2015 general elections has officially been postponed by 6 weeks. He said the new date for the presidential elections is March 28th while governorship elections will now hold April 11th. This is after majority of electoral commissioners in their own meeting had voted to have the elections continue according to schedule.

Before this annoucement, the postponement was said to be a done deal with armoured tanks stationed in Lagos and Abuja on the morning of Saturday.

A senior official of INEC who is involved in today’s meetings and requested anonymity, had told YNaija that the INEC chairman is torn between postponing the elections

“Chairman is stil very confused. We have just taken break for him to consult d oda guys. He doesn’t want 2 postpone, but d pressire from these people is 2 much. Meeting is on.”

“After the letter from security chiefs and calls from people in the Presidency, (the) chairman feels they want to blame him if people die from violence in the elections, and whatever it is, his determination is to leave these elections with his reputation intact.”

According to reports, the PDP party with the support of the Presidency are said to be behind the call to postpone the elections. One of the President’s advisers who also works actively in the PDP campaign had said yesterday;

“The President has completely lost confidence in INEC. People close to him have convinced him that APC is working with INEC to push him out, and now he is determined to do everything to stop that.”

The president’s spokesman confirmed this with a press conference to push for the postponement of elections. Other spokespeople on traditional and social media have also pushed the official line, calling for postponement of the elections due to insecurity and the huge challenges INEC has had with Permanent Voters Card distribution.