Speaker, Gbajabiamila Explains Why Nigerians in the Diaspora Can’t Vote Yet

Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mr Femi Gbajabiamila has said that Nigerians in the Diaspora cannot vote unless the constitution is amended.

The Speaker made this known during the Diaspora Voting Stakeholders Workshop held in Abuja.

There have been calls for Nigerians that reside outside the country to be allowed to vote in recent times seeing as there are improvements in technology but the Speaker does not think it is an easy task.

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Gbajabiamila revealed that when the bill was introduced in the 7th Senate, he shut it down because the wording of the constitution on it was black and white.

According to him: “I was the principal officer when this bill came up in the 7th assembly and I shut the Nigeria in diaspora voting bill down.

“I did that for reasons the house came to understand; the language of the constitution is black and white and it states that you can only vote if you are resident in Nigeria.”

The Speaker also said that it would be difficult to implement Diaspora voting at a time where the country was still struggling to organize elections.