Candidates have pleaded with the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, and the police to make sure that their staff do not tamper with the poll as the Ondo election approaches.
The candidates addressed at a stakeholders meeting hosted by INEC yesterday in Akure with all 17 gubernatorial candidates, election-related parties, and security agencies.
They urged the electoral commission and the police not to jeopardise the exercise, promising to make sure their supporters behaved in a civilised way both before and after the election.
Their appeal was premised on INEC Chairman Professor Yakubu Mahmood and Inspector General of Police Kayode Egbetokun’s announcement of their willingness to hold a free, fair, and credible election.
Mahmood said the commission would be “deploying the BVAS machines for voter accreditation at polling units and for the upload of results to the INEC Result Viewing (IReV) portal, and warned staff that “there will be consequences for dereliction of duty in any way or form.”
On the preparedness of the electoral umpire, Yakubu said that electoral activities implemented include voter registration and collection of Permanent Voters’ Cards (PVCs), and “two days ago, we uploaded to our website detailed information on the number of collected and uncollected PVCs for each of the 3,933 polling units in Ondo State.”
He continued: “In the information booklet distributed at this meeting, you will also see the number as well as distribution of the 2,053,061 registered voters by local government area, gender, age, occupation, and disability.
“You will also see the list of candidates, including names published by court order. We conducted a series of stakeholders’ meetings at the national, state, and local government levels, including meetings with the security agencies
“We have also accredited over radio, television, newspaper, and online media organisations deploying about 700 personnel, including 129 female journalists, the largest number for any off-cycle governorship elections in Nigeria.
“We have also accredited thousands of agents representing candidates and political parties for all the polling and collation locations across the state.
“I want to assure you that the accreditation cards for all categories of stakeholders are ready. Our state office here in Akure will soon commence the distribution of accreditation tags, including election duty vehicle stickers.
“In our various engagements with the security and law enforcement agencies, we underscored the importance of providing security during the election to guarantee personal safety and protection of observers, the media, our own officials (both regular and ad hoc staff), service providers such as transporters, and, above all, the citizens that will vote during the election.”
Mahmood expressed gladness stating “the relevant agencies have given us the necessary assurances of security during the election, including unimpeded access to voting and collation locations for observers and the media.”
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