Olusegun Agbaje, resident
electoral commissioner of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC)
in Osun state, says if vote-buying is not killed in Saturday’s governorship
election, the country is in serious trouble in 2019.
He said this at a press
conference at the INEC office in Osogbo, the state capital, on Friday.
Agbaje asked Osun voters to be
patient enough to devote at least two minutes of their time without phones for
the election.
He wondered why Nigerians would
switch off their phones for six to 10 hours while travelling abroad and would
not accuse the flight crew of infringing on their fundamental human rights but
would make the same accusation against INEC for two minutes of voting.
Agbaje said the commission did
not give out uncollected permanent voters card (PVC) to politicians as claimed
by some people.
“The commission has put in place
adequate preparation for the Osun state governorship election on Saturday,” he
said.
“As we speak, I can confidently
say that the commission is ready to make the election a model that will be
applauded by Nigerians and the international community. Some of the things we
have done include intensive voters education and public enlightenment campaign;
stakeholders meeting and we have distributed non-sensitive materials to the 30
local government areas.
“We have recruited 16,000 ad hoc
staff from serving members of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), students
of the Federal Polytechnic, Ede and Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife and
staff of federal establishments in Osun state.
“We have put in place adequate
security arrangement for the peaceful conduct of the election. There will be
three security agents at each polling units on election day as approved by the
commission to maintain law and order. Through a painstaking process that
involved data consolidation, automated fingerprint identification system,
business rules for PVC, CVR and transfers resulting into the registration
807,598 (48%) male and 874,897 (52%) female making a total of 1,682, 495
registered voters in Osun state.
“Then, we have issued 1,246,915
permanent voters cards (PVCs) representing (74.14%) to registered voters at the
end of the PVC collection period on Spetember 19, leaving a total of 435,015
PVCs, that is (25.86%) yet to be collected by their owners and are being kept
in the INEC strong room at the state office here in Osogbo.
“All of us have been talking and
complaining about vote-buying and the commission has put a strategy in place.
We have a duty to protect the integrity of our elections. Bringing phones and
other photographic devises is okay. INEC has benefited with what we have seen
on social media during elections. But once you collect our ballot paper, you
are now in our custody.
“Nigerians should be patient
enough to give INEC two minutes of their time, without snapping pictures. When
you board a plane, they tell people to switch off their phones and for about
six to ten hours if you are going to London or America, people don’t see it as
fundamental human rights abuse. But for two minutes that Nigerians will give to
INEC, people are saying we are infringing on their fundamental human rights.
“If we don’t kill vote-buying
here in Osun tomorrow, we are in serious trouble in 2019.”
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