Tinubu does not have the power to place the Chair of the Inec in Terminal Leave – Falana

Human rights lawyer, Femi Falana (San), said that the President of Bola Tinubu did not have constitutional authority to force the Chairperson of the Independent National Election Commission (INEC), Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, to continue the terminal leave.

Falana made a clarification on Friday after the widespread report claimed that the President had ordered Jacobu to move before the end of his term of office in October 2025. The report that was not verified accused that the direction was associated with Jacobu’s betrayal which was supposed to be in the last minute of all the progress of the congress for 2023 elections.

Speculation received attention earlier this week after Inec suddenly canceled a quarterly consultative meeting with political parties and other scheduled sessions with civil society organizations.

In his response, Falana emphasized that Inec, unlike other federal bodies, operated independently of the president’s control.

Also read: Police denied killing alleged armed robbers in detention

“Unlike other Federal Executive Board, the Independent National Election Commission, its strength to make its own rules or regulate its own procedures may not be subject to the approval or control of the president. So far, the President of the Tinubu Bola cannot direct the Chairperson of Inec to continue the terminal leave,” he said.

He further remembered that in 2015, similar rumors circulated that at that time the Chairperson of Inec, Prof. Attahiru Jega, has been placed on terminal leave. The report, he said, was then found wrong.

“We showed that at the time of the material that the Chairperson of Inec could not be directed by the authority to start the terminal leave. It turned out that the President did not give such direction,” Falana added.

Jacobu, who was first appointed in 2015 by the former President of Muhammadu Buhari and was re -appointed in 2020 after the confirmation of the Senate, will complete his second term in October 2025, making him the first Inec chairman to serve two consecutive term.