Ben Ezechime, Enugu
The Resident Electoral Commissioner REC for Enugu State, Dr Chukwuemeka Chukwu, says INEC has concluded arrangements for a hitch-free Governorship and State Assembly elections as well as rescheduled Enugu East Senatorial Zone poll on March 18.
The REC announced this on Wednesday at a press conference held in Enugu on the preparedness of the commission for elections.
Chukwu said that the conference was to inform the electorate and critical stakeholders in Enugu State on the commission’s preparedness to conduct a peaceful, hitch-free, credible and fair polls come March 18.
He noted that INEC in Enugu State had received sensitive materials from its national headquarters at the beginning of the week, adding that the sensitive materials were all stored and kept safe at the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Enugu branch.
According to him, INEC officials (on Monday) and heads of security agencies (on Tuesday) have gone to inspect the sensitive materials and all have testified that the sensitive materials are still intact.
“INEC Enugu will start moving the sensitive materials to its local government area offices on Thursday, March 16, from the CBN in presence of security personnel and political party representatives and the media.
“On Friday, March, 17; the same sensitive materials will be moved from the local government area offices to the various Registration Area Centres (RAC) in the presence of security personnel, political party agents and the media.
“At the RAC, the sensitive materials and other non sensitive materials will be sorted out and ready for upward movement to the 4,145 polling units across the state on or before 8 a.m. on Saturday; since voting will start 8:30 a.m. on the dot on March 18,” he said.
Chukwu noted that the commission had completed the reconfiguring of 4,145 Bi-Modal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) machines, meant for the March 18 polls, a day ago.
“They are ready for the commission to deploy them simultaneously as the other sensitive materials are moving to the designated polling units on the Election Day,” he said.
The REC said that he had received concrete assurances from security agencies of their readiness and pro-active deployment of their personnel for the election.
“In our last Inter-Agency Consultative Committee on Election Security (ICCES) meeting; the commission received overwhelming assurances that security will be water-tight on the Election Day and that security agencies have made all necessary manpower deployment,” he said.
Chukwu said that he had met with the transport unions’ leaders, with their executives and collections of drivers, and they had assured that there would be no hitch.
“The transporters clearly told INEC management staff that the failure that occurred in the Feb. 25 polls will never repeats itself again,” he said.
He said that the commission would conclude all its retraining and refresher training for all its ad hoc staff – presiding officers, assistant presiding officers, supervisors, collation officers and returning officers – by Friday morning, March 17 and all duly posted immediately.
The REC said that INEC would be conducting election in 4,145 polling units in 260 Registration Areas (or political wards) and 17 local government areas of the state.
“So the elections will be for the governorship, 24 state constituency offices as well as the rescheduled Enugu East Senatorial Zone due to the death of one of the candidates in the earlier election on Feb. 22,” he explained.
