Electoral Act faces delay at National Assembly, harmonisation yet to start
There were strong indications on Thursday that the Electoral Act (Amendment) Bill would suffer further delay at the National Assembly as the Senate and the House of Representatives had yet to refer different versions of the bill to the Conference Committee.
The Senate and the House had on Wednesday reviewed the bill for which the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), had withheld assent over the restriction of political parties to direct primaries in the selection of candidates for elections.
By passing different amendments to the bill, the Senate and the House will have to refer the versions to a conference committee to harmonise the differences and report back for final passage and transmission to the President for assent.
After the passage on Wednesday, the President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan, had said the National Assembly would transmit the revised bill to Buhari for assent this week.
