Election: Journalists rescued as boat capsizes in Bayelsa

A boat conveying journalists across flooded parts of Sampou community on Nun River in Kolokuma Opokuma local government area of Bayelsa state capsized on Saturday.

The boat was carrying four journalists covering the governorship election. They were returning from a polling station when the incident happened.

Some residents quickly moved in to rescue them but before then their mobile phones, cameras and recorders had been drenched.

A stretch of about 200 metres along the road leading to polling unit 4, ward 6, where the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Douye Diri, voted was flooded, compelling the journalists to resort to local canoes to cross.

The flood had delayed the setting up of polling stations across the community.

It submerged many parts of Amasoma, Yenagoa and parts of Sagbama, a development that displaced some polling stations.

Diri, who voted around 10:35am, said the elections were peaceful in his area but added that he got reports of electoral fraud, violence in Nembe, Opolo and Enewari, among other areas in the state.

David Lyon of the All Progressives Congress (APC) is Diri’s main rival in the election.