By Levinus Nwabughiogu

ABUJA—Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mr Yakubu Dogara, said, yesterday, that the Federal Government was treating the 2019 general election as an emergency.

Speaker Dogara

Dogara spoke at the meeting of the leadership of both chambers of the National Assembly with chairman of Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, to consider funding the request made by President Muhammadu Buhari for 2019 elections.

Recall that elections in Nigeria are held every four years to elect president, Vice president, governors, deputy governors and members of the National Assembly as well as state Houses of Assembly.

But in the meeting of the NASS leadership, Dogara expressed concerns about the seeming emergency approach being taken towards the elections.

He said: “As leaders of the National Assembly, we are committed to appropriating whatever is needed within the confines of the resources of the nation for INEC to be able to actualise this and that is why this meeting is important.

“However, personally, I have some questions that I intend to raise, but I will raise these in the process of discussion because it appears that we are treating this 2019 election as an emergency, which it ought not to be, so that is just my concern.”

The speaker further stated that the legislature was committed to free, fair and credible elections in 2019.

Acknowledging the gains recorded during the last election cycle in 2015, the speaker, however, urged the electoral umpire to ensure the standards were improved upon.

“I want to reiterate that we are committed to an electoral process that will better our experiences of our 2015 general elections.”