By JOHN ONAH, Imo –
As all arrangements are in top gear towards a successful conduct of off cycle governorship election in Imo state, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) said on Friday that it was far ahead of the challenges faced during the presidential election in February.
The Head, Voter Education and Publicity, Ben-Opara Emmanuella, stated this in an interview with journalists in Owerri, Imo state capital.
The INEC official assured citizens of the state early arrival of materials and officials, saying that what happened during the February presidential election won’t happen again, adding that polls will open by 8.30pm.
She said: “That’s why one of the many reasons why we activating the Registration Area Centres (RAC). Initially during the last elections, we had issues with early commencement of polls, but this time, you know, as days go by, you update yourself, you take corrections in whatever thing you’ve done before. So what we are doing differently now is that apart from the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the National Union of Road Transport Workers and NATO, we have again, decided to decentralize the hiring of buses.
“In the Presidential elections, we had two challenges. One there was lack of funds. We never had money, so we agreed with them that we will pay them half of the costs of their service and after reverse logistics, we pay them the balance, they accepted. But midway very early in the morning about 4am, they reneged, they said we are going to pay them full and there was no money around. So we had to call head office, after which we made special arrangements with the Central Bank that gave us some money to pay them. Before those things happened, It was late for them to actually go to the field.
“But this time, we have paid them. We have given monies to electoral officers in the local government to hire buses and with this arrangement, there will be nothing like late commencement of polls. While we said that RAC centers must be activated is to ensure limited travel time from the RAC center to the polling units. So I anticipate and I expect that we will commence early.
On the ongoing strike by organised Labour in Imo State, she noted that it will not in any way affect the conduct of tomorrow’s governorship election in the state.
The commission insisted that all plans have been put in place to ensure a hitch-free poll across all Local Government Areas in Imo state.
It would recalled that in protest against the brutalisation of the National President of the Nigerian Labour Congress, NLC, Joe Ajaero, last week, by operatives of the Nigeria Police Force, organised labour unions had on Tuesday, ordered a shutdown of electricity and fuel supplies in Imo State.
In protest against the assault, the organised Labour Thursday also disrupted all Owerri-bound flights at the Lagos and Abuja airports and forced passengers to deplane.
The union leaders and their members picketed the Nnamidi Azikiwe International Airport, disrupting the operations of the facility and leaving many passengers stranded.
But responding to question whether the ongoing action by the Labour unions would disrupt INEC’s plans for the election, Emmanuella said INEC was ready for the election, adding that there was no cause for alarm.
According to her, arrangements have been concluded with members of the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) and Nigerian Association of Road Transport Owners (NARTO) to convey INEC officials and materials to their respective polling units.
She said, “For us, the labour issue hasn’t really affect us because we had completed everything before it started. The only area that we are yet to complete our action is with the NURTW but as we all know they are not part of NLC And even if they are part of it, they have assured us they will provide their vehicles for us. But for any other thing, we have completed everything. You know, we started trainings early. We received materials early. The only materials left before the strike started was the sensitive materials that arrived on Tuesday.”
We are ready. As we speak all our materials sensitive and non sensitive have gone to the field. We have concluded all levels of training. Everything has been deployed to the field. The centers will be activated today. We’ve told them as early as four o’clock we expect the RAC centers to be activated. We expect all personnel to be at the RAC centers, because we will say have a refresher training today at the RAC centers.
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