Local elections to be held on 18 May

Local elections will be held across Nigeria on 18 May, to mark the start of the process to reaffirm or vote out political leaders elected in 1999, officials of State Independent Electoral Commissions (SIECs) said on Tuesday.

The decision was reached on Friday in the capital, Abuja, at a meeting of the chairmen of state electoral bodies in the country's 36 states. It resolved uncertainties over when the local polls would be held following a recent Supreme Court ruling that overturned the extension of the tenure of local
councils from three to four years by the National Assembly.

"We have resolved to hold the local government elections on 18 May nationwide so as to be able to adhere strictly to the Supreme Court judgment," Ja'afaru Zaggi, who heads a committee of chairmen of SIECs, said in statement on Tuesday.

The states' electoral bodies also decided to use the voters' register used during the 1999 elections since it was not possible to update the register in time for the local elections.

The local elections afford new political parties the opportunity to participate in other polls due in the first quarter of 2003. Under Nigeria's 1999 constitution, new political parties must first win a stipulated number of seats in local elections in order to qualify to contest the subsequent polls.

Nigeria had been gripped by political controversy after the national legislature in December 2001 passed a new law which stipulated that local elections be held last after presidential, gubernatorial and legislative polls. This in effect extended the tenure of elected local governments to four years from the three prescribed by the constitution. It also technically barred new parties from contesting state and national positions until 2007.

The move was widely viewed as a ploy by President Olusegun Obasanjo to keep out emerging political parties who could threaten his re-election plans in 2003.

However, governors of the country's 36 states filed a suit at the Supreme Court challenging the electoral law saying it usurped powers granted under the constitution to the states over local governments. A unanimous Supreme Court verdict delivered last month nullified the extension of the tenure of local governments.