Daily Watch – Tinubu declared president-elect, Nigeria put on FATF grey list

Ruling party candidate Bola Tinubu was declared winner of Nigeria’s presidential election early Wednesday and soon after thanked his supporters and appealed to his rivals who are already demanding a revote in Africa’s most populous country. The announcement by election officials overnight was likely to lead to a court challenge by the second-and third-highest finishers in the weekend vote, Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party and Peter Obi of the Labour Party. Tinubu’s ruling All Progressives Congress party urged the opposition to accept defeat Tuesday and not cause trouble after they had demanded a revote saying that delays in uploading election results had made room for irregularities. Tinubu received 37% of the vote, or nearly 8.8 million, while the main opposition candidate Abubakar won 29% with almost 7 million. Third-place finisher Obi took 25% with about 6.1 million, according to the results announced on live television by the Independent National Electoral Commission. The parties now have three weeks to appeal the results. An election can be invalidated only if it’s proven the national electoral body largely didn’t follow the law and acted in ways that could have changed the result. The Supreme Court has never overturned a presidential election.

The global money laundering and terrorist financing watchdog, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), has placed Nigeria on its grey list. Countries placed on the grey list are subjected to increased monitoring and have to actively work with the FATF to counter the shortcomings of their laws. They include countries like Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, South Sudan, and Haiti. 73 percent of countries have been removed since the list’s inception, it is not a permanent list, and nations have the chance to be taken off, after cooperating with the FATF to address their failings. The implications of the list could, however, have severe consequences. South Africa’s rand fell against the dollar after the country was placed on the list last Friday.

The Deputy Chairman of the Electoral Commission in charge of Corporate Services says his outfit is determined to see to the passage of the Constitutional Instrument (CI) that seeks to make the Ghana Card the sole document for voter registration. According to Dr Bossman Asare, the CI will improve the verification system for voters. Responding to questions in an interview on JoyNews’ Upfront on what will make the Electoral Commission back down on making the Ghana Card the only viable card for voting, he confidently said “unless there is force majeure.” However, the Chairperson of the Electoral Commission (EC), Jean Mensa has revealed that the Ghana Card will not be a requirement in the casting of votes in the 2024 General Elections. She said that the Ghana Card will be the sole identity document to be used in the voter’s registration process in the acquisition of new Voters’ IDs if the new constitutional instrument is passed.

A French court dismissed a case brought by NGOs against TotalEnergies with regard to a massive oil project in Uganda and Tanzania. It was the first case of its kind in France, and activists had hoped it would set a legal precedent to halt projects deemed harmful to the environment and human rights. The court on Tuesday ruled the case was “inadmissible” because the plaintiffs submitted accounts to the court in December that was “substantially different” from those that were presented to TotalEnergies in 2019 when the case was initiated. The suit was brought by two French and four Ugandan NGOs, which accused TotalEnergies of taking land from more than 100,000 people without adequate compensation.