The Independent Electoral Commission on Friday moved sensitive materials such as the ballot papers and result sheets, to Remo North, Ikenne and Sagamu Local Government Areas ahead of the Saturday, August 16, bye – election for Remo Federal Constituency of Ogun State.
The INEC Resident Electoral Commissioner for the state, Mrs Saseyi Feyijimi, who coordinated the movement of sensitive materials from the premises of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Abeokuta zonal office has equally assured of transparent process in the conduct of the poll.
Mrs Feyijimi also said that a total of 2445 INEC officers have been trained to handle the bye-election in the state.
The inspection and movement of the materials were witnessed by critical state holders, including security agencies and agents of three political parties – Olusegun Bankole (APC), Afolabi Orekoya (Peoples Democratic Party, PDP) and Ayodeji Daodu (ACCORD) Party.
Feyijimi told reporters that the Commission was fully committed to be transparent, adding that the 2,445 officers trained for the bye – election had been warned not to engage in any infraction.
She emphasized that the INEC would not defend anybody including its official who goes out to engage in any infraction, saying anybody caught violating the law will not be spared of the consequences.
Feyijimi explained, ”Today we are at the CBN to pick sensitive materials – the result sheets and ballot papers. The non – sensitive materials have been distributed to the local governments areas earlier.
“The critical stakeholders are here, members of the inter – agency consultative committee on election security are all here. We have the supporting Resident Electoral Commissioner from Lagos who is also here and we have the political parties present.
”The usual practice is to distribute materials in the open so that everybody can see. And all can see that the materials have not been opened and pictures have been taken for everybody to see that we are doing it in a transparent manner
”We promise to be fair, to be just and be open to all. Every exercise that we do, we publish it. We have platform for the media and we have platform for the security agencies. We tell them that at every point in time what we are going to do.
“That is why they are all here and we have made it so open. Even in the local governments where elections are taking place, our officers in conjunction with the National Orientation Agency (NOA) have been sensitizing the people. Nothing is hidden and our doors are open.
”The adhoc staff we have trained, some of them are already on their way to their centres. The election commences 8:30am tomorrow in all polling centres and ends 2:30pm but if you are on the queue at the close of the poll, you would be allowed to vote.
“We have officials to do the job. We have trained 2,445 officials as of Friday, August 15. We have our BIVAS ready and we have back ups.
”On our part, we are committed to be transparent. We are not going to defend anybody (staffer) who goes out to engage in any infraction. We have warned our staff that everybody should do what is right.
“Anybody caught doing any infraction (is on his or her own) because the National Chairman has also warned us that anybody doing any infraction will not be spared.”
Recall that the Remo Federal Constituency became vacant due to the death of House Representatives Deputy Chief Whip, Otunba Adewunmi Onanuga, popularly called Ijaya on January 15
Mrs Onanuga, until her demise was a second term federal lawmaker elected on the platform the All Progressives Congress to represent the three local governments of Sagamu, Ikenne and Remo North.
