The last is yet to be heard of the controversy that trailed the conduct of the 2023 general elections as an interdenominational and international platform of Christians who pray for Nigeria, the National Prayer Altar, called for the probe of the chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Prof. Mahmood Yakubu.

The platform made of Christians from the six geo-political zones and diaspora insisted that the electoral umpire headed by Yakubu contradicted its own regulations and actively frustrated the electoral process, particularly in the deployment of appropriate facilities and logistics.

In a statement made available to journalists on Sunday, signed by Pastor Bosun Emmanuel (Southwest), Kontein Trinya (Southsouth), Sylvester Mbamali (Southeast), Linda Ndache (Northeast), Alabi Mojirade (Northcentral) and Hauwa Kure (Northwest), the group also faulted some Christian bodies for congratulating a government its “legitimacy is still in contention at the courts”.

The group’s demand is coming few days after Yakubu declared that the overall outlook of the 2023 election suggest it is a fair reflection of Nigeria’s complex multi-party democracy

Stressing the need for INEC to be interrogated about its handling of the 2023 elections, the group maintained that Yakubu should be properly investigated, noting that he is not beyond the law.

The organisation said: “The 2023 elections have ranked as the worst in the history of Nigeria. Not only did INEC contradict its regulations, it actively sought to frustrate the electoral process, particularly in the deployment of appropriate facilities and logistics in that election. It is imperative that INEC be interrogated about its handling of the 2023 elections, and the Chairman of INEC, Prof. Yakubu Mahmood, be properly investigated, unless this public officer is beyond the laws of the land. The appropriate human and civil rights organizations in the country should commence a process towards that interrogation, as a precedence in future electoral engagements.

It added: “It is disturbing that Christian leaders who have appeared helpless and speechless in the face of the ongoing massacre of Christian communities in Nigeria would be so prompt to endorse persons and structures that have posed the greatest existential challenge to their brothers and sisters. It is sad that CAN would write a letter of congratulation to a government whose legitimacy is still in contention at the courts. It seems to announce, sadly, that CAN supports the Muslim-Muslim ticket which it had all the while appeared to vehemently oppose.

“It is worrisome irony smacking of hypocrisy. It is sub judice, not righteousness, to so take sides, especially as election results are not only being challenged but the conduct of the election itself has been globally condemned for its many apparent constitutional violations. While CAN might have been comparatively modest in its congratulations, the national leadership of the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN) appears to have thrown caution to the winds in effusively pronouncing blessings on a flawed process and its objectionable product. We hope that the appropriate organs of the PFN will redeem the image of that respectable Fellowship by calling an enquiry into how and who had authorized the letter and the worrisome congratulatory benedictions pronounced upon persons of publicly disputed legitimacy.

“Meanwhile, let it be on record that, to the extent that the generality of the Church and its leadership were not consulted before those public statements were made, and since those masses have continued to express their discontent at the ecclesiastical leadership overstep, the congratulations remain the tolerable political correctness of those that sent them.

“Their messages do not represent the voice of the people and are not binding on the Church in Nigeria. Those who rig elections can neither claim to have been ordained by God nor to mean well for the people. Nothing good comes out of fraud.”

Noting that the country is at a moment when the judiciary is on trial, the organisation observed that in weeks to come, “Nigerians shall pronounce their verdict on the judiciary, whether guilty or not guilty.”

It further expressed concerns about the obvious manipulation of ethnic sentiments for political advantage in the country, adding that the social virus is deliberately being resuscitated by self-seeking individuals to the detriment of unity and peace of Nigeria.

“The candidacy of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu is not a Yoruba agenda, neither is the candidacy of Mr. Peter Obi an Igbo agenda. The attempt to manipulate an impression that the Yoruba people entirely support Asiwaju Tinubu as their “own” is a mischievous political game. During the presidential election, the Yorubas, like most other Nigerians, demonstrated their exasperation with the corrupt governance of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the past twenty-four years.

“In the same vein, the attempt by some errant Igbos to give the impression that Peter Obi is an Igbo candidate is equally out of place. That candidate has had the support of progressive Nigerians all over the world; in fact, the support of progressive people everywhere in the world”, the group added.