ECOWAS Parliament Urges Parties To Respect Results

 

DAKAR—The Parliament of Economic Community of West African States, ECOWAS, has called on parties in the February 23 presidential election in Nigeria to respect the outcome of the polls in line with its protocol on democracy and good governance.

President of ECOWAS Parliament, Mustapha Cisse Lo, made the call at the opening of the Extra Ordinary Session of the ECOWAS Parliament in Dakar, Senegal, while congratulating Nigeria and Senegal for conducting successful elections.

It would be recalled that Election Observation Mission of ECOWAS, led by former Liberian President, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, had said despite challenges of violence, delays and malfunctioning of smart card readers in some parts of the country, the National Assembly and presidential elections were generally peaceful and transparent.

According to Cisse Lo, the current session for the parliament is being held in the regional context marked by success of the organisation of presidential elections in Nigeria and Senegal.

He said: “Indeed, the Senegalese and Nigerian elections have proclaimed their results that were held February 23, 2019 for Nigeria, and February 24, 2019 for Senegal.

“These results declared very legitimately saw the re-election of his Muhammadu Buhari as the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and his Macky Sall as President of the Republic of Senegal. I wish to affirm and reaffirm once again my congratulations to Muhammadu Buhari and Macky Sall, for their brilliant success that strengthened the genuineness of democracy in our sub-region.

“I call on the political actors to continue to respect the official results of these elections in accordance with the relevant provisions of ECOWAS Protocol on Democracy and Good Governance.”

Cisse Lo explained that the lawmakers were meeting in Darker to review the programmes of the Parliament for 2019 and adopt the term of reference for the oversight missions and also terms of reference for the sensitisation missions for the first semester of 2019.

He said they gathered “to adopt the terms of reference of the delocalize meetings of the parliament for the first semester 2019; adopt the conclusions recommendations  of the parliamentary seminar on Single Currency of ECOWAS which has just ended.”

Other agenda of the Extra Ordinary Session, according to Mr.Cisse Lo, is “to adopt the terms of reference of the delocalize meetings of the parliament for the first semester 2019; adopt the conclusions recommendations of the parliamentary seminar on Single Currency of ECOWAS which has just ended.”

Mr. Cisse Lo commended the Secretary General of the ECOWAS Parliament for organizing activities of the Parliament, despite all the constraints and limited resources at his disposal, especially in terms of human resources.