Election postponed in some areas - INEC Boss

Election postponed in some areas - INEC Boss
By Qasim Akinreti, Lagos

The Nigerian electoral commission has postponed national elections in 15 senatorial districts and 46 federal constituencies  for logistics reasons.

Professor Attahiru Jega, electoral commission boss said that fifteen out of the one hundred and nine senatorial districts and forty-eight out of the three hundred and sixty federal constituencies for the House of Representatives will hold their elections on Tuesday April 26.

He explained that these elections would hold simultaneously with the State Governorship and State Assemblies elections.

Professor Jega gave the assurance that all the necessary logistics needed to ensure a hitch free National Assembly election in Nigeria had been put in place.

He urged Nigerians to conduct themselves in a manner that will ensure smooth and credible elections on Saturday.

Reaction

The Nigerian Political Summit Group, NPSG, a coalition of thirty political parties and civil society groups in Nigeria has however disagreed with the electoral commission on partial election postponement.

The group urged the Electoral Commission, to ensure that the scheduled parliamentary election for this weekend holds without further postponement.

Spokesman of the group, Alhaji Buba Yusuf, said if for any reason INEC is not prepared for election in some areas; election should go on as planned in all other states of the country.

Alhaji Yusuf who is also the Chairman of one of the political parties, the Advance Congress of Democrats, appealed to Nigerians to come out en-mass to participate in the National Assembly elections.

Redeployment

 As part of the new strategy for Saturday’s election, the electoral commission has embarked on redeployment of staff across the states.

In Lagos, the public relations officer, Femi Akinbiyi has been moved to Osun state while the Resident Electoral Commissioner for Imo State, southeast, Nigeria, Mrs Celine Okoh, was redeployed to   Abuja, the Nigerian Capital, just forty-eight hours before the rescheduled National Assembly election. The Head of Operations in the State, Emmanuel Owete has also been redeployed.

Redeployment of staff is a normal administrative procedure within the Electoral Commission, but Mrs Okoh has been at the receiving end of complaints by some opposition political parties in the State who accused her of bias.

Imo is one of the few States in the country where voting materials for the National Assembly elections have been found in the possession of unauthorized people.

Appeal

From the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has come a fresh appeal to workers to shun acts that may threaten the credibility of the forthcoming elections. NLC President, Abdulwaheed Omar, said one very important way of doing this was for workers not to allow themselves to be used as agents of political violence.

Omar, speaking in Kaduna, said workers would be better off if they concentrated on voting for politicians who will stop wasteful spending, and instead concentrate on combating unemployment, insecurity and ethno-religious intolerance.

He added that the NLC was looking forward to a credible election devoid of bloodletting, mayhem, acrimony, blackmail and politicians practising what he called “do or die politics”.

Additional reports from Barth Ikiebe, Kaduna and Obiora Ani, Abuja.

Ekata