Town Hall Meeting With Christian Leaders Organised By The Alliance For Credible Elections and The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) at Rockview Hotel Abuja on Thursday, 11TH January 2007

The meeting had in attendance the Catholic Archbishop of Abuja Arch Diocese Most Rev. John Onayekan, Secretary General of CAN, Eng S.L.S. Salisu, Rev.Dr. Moses Iloh and other notable Christian leaders from across the board. Also present were representatives of various civil society groups.



His Grace Arch Bishop John Onayekan gave the opening remarks.



The following people presented papers:



Festus Okoye – VOTER REGISTARTION SCORECARD

Emma Ezeazu – NON VIOLENT DEFENCE OF MANDATE

Rev. Dr. Moses Iloh – THE CHURCH’S EXPECTATION ON ACHIEVING CREDIBLE ELECTIONS

Chief Iloh – CHRISTIAN FRAMEWORK FOR CREDIBLE ELECTIONS



Some issues that were raised for consideration were:

* Importance of monitoring the elections not to be left to the traditional constituencies of the church and NGOs. He said in the Philippines which is much smaller than Nigeria about half a million people were deployed.
* Agreeing to have a joint statement by monitoring groups
* Mandate defence
* What happens to meetings like this—who should host, frequency of meetings, etc
* How to comply with non-violent protests and ensure that they are not hijacked


ACTION POINTS



1. Christian leaders should constantly speak out on the need for credible elections and mobilise their members to ensure that 2007 elections are held and are credible
2. CAN should deploy election monitors to the 120,000 polling stations in the country. The Justice Development and Peace Commission JDPC deployed about 30,000 in the 2003 elections.
3. The monitors should be well trained before they are deployed. CAN should work closely with other groups like the TMG who have expertise in training and deployment of election monitors
4. Domestic election monitors in the country should work towards a joint statement at the end of the elections
5. Christian leaders must prepare to reject elections that do not reflect the votes of the people by training their constituencies on non-violent defence of peoples’ mandate. The training of election monitors should be combined with that of mandate defence
6. CAN should raise money for its election-monitoring project. It should explore the possibility of raising money from development agencies that are interested in election observation
7. ACE and the CAN secretariat should meet to work out the modalities for closer collaboration between the two groups on how to move the outcome of this meeting forward
8. A joint meeting of Christian and Moslem leaders should be organized to explore the possibility of collaboration on election observation and mandate defence
9. His Grace Bishop Onayekan to facilitate a meeting between CAN ACE and prof. Iwu
10. Depending on the outcome of further consultations between the two bodies, it is tentatively agreed that this meeting should be held fortnightly.



The General Secretary of ACE-Nigeria, in his closing remarks thanked participants for the precision of the meeting. He pointed out that Bishop Oritsejiofor sent his regards to the meeting as he expressed his inability to be in attendance. The General Secretary of ACE thanked specifically the Christian Association of Nigeria for deep mobilisation. He accepted the fortnightly meeting and said ACE would take on the responsibility of hosting the meeting. He said he appreciated the sacrifice made by all who came. Rev Saidu Dogo said the closing prayers at 1:12pm.