I won’t settle for underage wives as voters, says Olujimi

The Senator representing Ekiti South Senatorial District, Biodun Olujimi, has vowed to reject any proposal searching for voting powers for underage married women ought to it come up for debate within the Senate.

Olujimi, a former Senate Minority Chief, said this in an interview with our correspondent in Abuja, on Tuesday.

The Senator alleged that promoters of such a proposal have been searching for a wise method’ of legalising youngster marriage and seize their victims within the electoral system to realize undue benefit over different areas.

The unique report final week uncovered a proposal by members of the Nationwide Meeting to push by a modification to the Electoral Act to allow underaged wives to vote throughout elections.

Chairman, Senate Committee on the Unbiased Nationwide Electoral Fee, Senator Kabiru Gaya, and his counterpart within the Home of representatives, Aisha Dukku, introduced the proposal to a Technical Committee on the Electoral Act Modification Invoice.

Some estimates put the variety of youngster brides in houses in northern Nigeria at about forty million.

However, Olujimi mentioned, “The concept of capturing underage married ladies in our electoral system by recognising them as voters don’t make sense.

“Solely the grownup, as outlined by the Nigerian structure must be eligible to vote. Why ought to we be proposing a regulation that will all of a sudden flip our younger youngsters to adults?

“The very first thing to assault is the problem of kid marriage. We should always have minimal. There needs to be a type to qualify a girl to be both a grownup or eligible voter and our structure has clarified that already.

“We should persist with our voting age. The proposal is a great manner of bringing an enormous chunk of individuals into the voting system. That isn’t proper, it’s not appropriate.

“Whoever that’s married to an underage woman must be affected person till such a woman turns 18 earlier than, she must be allowed to vote. This may increasingly even stop these marrying underage women from additional defiling our youngsters.

“When the matter is dropped at the ground of the Senate, we’ll certainly be there to assault and reject it as a result of I can’t sit down and watch my 14-12 months-previous granddaughter, became a grownup rapidly since you need to commit electoral fraud.”