By Farooq Kperogi
I wrote a tongue-in-cheek, intentionally sarcastic status update yesterday that I won’t be surprised of the INEC (Independent National Electoral Commission) chairman gets an APC presidential nomination form while still an INEC chairman given the norm-bending absurdities that we’ve been seeing in APC’s presidential nomination exercise where a serving CBN (Central Bank of Nigeria) governor has thrown his hat in the ring of presidential contest without first resigning his job.
In apparent reaction to my sarcasm, INEC issued a statement today insisting that the INEC chairman will not run for president🤣
“Our attention has been drawn to innuendoes in certain quarters that Nigerians should not be surprised if the INEC chairman joins the presidential race…. It is a preposterous proposition. It will not happen,” INEC said in an official statement.🤣
I initially said satire was dead in Nigeria when I read the statement. I was wrong. Satire is alive and kicking at INEC. It writes itself there. All you have to do is read it.
Seriously, though, the fact that INEC has a need to officially respond to a joke, an obvious joke, about its chairman joining the APC presidential nomination charade dramatizes the depths of silliness to which our politics have sunk under APC.