Edo guber won’t be postponed, INEC boss assures

Despite last Friday’s heavy downpour that destroyed critical equipment in the Edo State office of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the Chairman of INEC, Professor Mahmood Yakubu on Thursday assured that the commission will not shift the date for the governorship election in Edo

He maintained that INEC is poised to conduct, a free, fair and credible poll in the state, noting that the affected infrastructure would be repaired or replaced before the election.

Yakubu stated this in Benin City while inspecting the level of damages to the facilities in the office in Benin and monitoring the level of compliance with the ongoing Continuous Voters Registration (CVR) and collection of Permanent Voters Cards (PVC) in the State.

The INEC boss further stated that the Commission was prepared for the election in Edo State and the next one which is that of Ondo State where he said the CVR would commence very soon.

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He disclosed that since the Edo guber poll is an off-cycle election, the Commission would be borrowing equipment from neighbouring states to ensure a hitch-free exercise.

Accompanied by senior personnel of the Commission from the National Headquarter and the state, the INEC boss said he also came for the visit with three National Directors in charge of critical areas of the Commission like Voters Registry, Estate, Works and Transport and ICT to assess the level of damage to their facilities, including the State Controller of the Federal Ministry of Works which would carry out needed construction work in the facilities.

On whether there are plans by the commission to relocate its State head office to another area in Benin owing to the perennial flooding in Aduwawa, its current location, Yakubu ruled out such a move.

According to him “Our visit here is to ensure that we fix whatever we need to fix because of the election. We have three months and three weeks to the election and that is why we came here to inspect what happened to our facility on Friday last week

“So there is no immediate plan to relocate, we believe from what is here we can fix them before the election and it is better actually that we conduct the election in our facilities rather than going to rent any facility outside close to the election.

“Before the last governorship election in Edo we took measures and for three years since the last governorship election, we have had no issues but this is an act of God.”

Asked to quantify the  cost of damage in the Edo facility, Yakubu said: “It is very difficult to quantify now, we are on the assessment that is why in this tour we have been joined by three critical Directors responsible for Voters Registry, our Estate, Works and Transport at the headquarters and our Director of ICT so they will stay behind, do the assessment and advice the Commission.”

He assured that despite the setbacks, the Commission was ready for the election “Let me use this opportunity to assure and reassure Edo voters that it is unfortunate that this thing happened in our office on Friday.

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“We took a proactive measure to ensure that the Continuous Voters Registration (CVR) was not affected by calling for additional  resources from the neighbouring states

“whatever it takes, since INEC is one national body and we are only going to have two elections in Edo and Ondo states, I will call for additional resources where it is necessary from neighbouring states and the elections will proceed as scheduled and we will recover from this unfortunate incident.”

On whether the ten days for the CVR would be extended as being agitated in some quarters, Professor Yakubu said “We have not reached there yet, we will go round and see what happened

Earlier, the Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC),  Dr Anugbum Onuoha said the flood could be termed a blessing in disguise as it has better prepared them for the election.

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