The Independent Electoral Commission completed the nomination process for the presidential election which took a whole week. Twenty-six aspirants were scheduled to appear before the Commission to submit their papers but five did not submit their papers and fifteen were rejected. The Commission accepted the nomination of only six candidates, five of whom were sponsored by political parties.
It is significant to note that the nomination of nearly all the candidates were rejected because their nomination is not supported either by at least 200 voters in a region or at least 5000 voters in the country as a whole. This suggests that maintaining a large number of nominators to support the candidature of an aspirant is a means of controlling the number candidates that would qualify for nomination. Furthermore, maintaining a minimum of 200 nominators for each region gives a semblance of national character of the candidates.
This is a better means of reducing the number of candidates than the introduction of high deposits which works to the advantage of the rich and powerful.
Needless to say, the detection of fraud in the nomination paper of a presidential aspirant would scare future candidates from taking such path given the risk involved.
