Ahead of the November 16 governorship elections in Kogi and Bayelsa States, the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC) has said it would issue a notice for the elections on August 17.
Mrs May Agbamuche, Honourable National Commissioner, Legal Services, INEC made the disclosure on Tuesday in his remarks at the Stakeholders Round Table on the Commission preparedness towards the elections in the two states.
Checks revealed that the electoral umpire had earlier issued timetable and schedule of activities for the elections.
Mrs Agbamuche said political parties would commence their primaries from August 18 to be closely followed by campaigns by political parties. The INEC Commissioner further disclosed that in accordance with the Electoral Act, September 23 is “the last date for the withdrawal by candidates and the replacement of the withdrawn candidates by the political parties.”
Speaking further, Mrs Agbamuche declared that INEC would use the same template used for the 2019 general elections and ensure the deployment of security personnel to the Head office, local government and all polling units in the respective states.
In his remarks, Major General John Ochai, who represented the Chief of Army Staff, Tukur Buratai admitted that Bayelsa posed a serious challenge because of its terrain but assured that the military has since opened discussions with INEC ahead of the November election to surmount logistics challenge.
He said: “For the Nigerian Army, Bayelsa presents some logistic challenge because of the terrain. The creeks are an area where conventional means of transport can’t reach. For Kogi, we have our contingency plan in place. We shall continue to do our assessment in conjunction with INEC in our regular security meetings.”
Mrs Faith Nwadishi, Executive Director of Centre for Transparency Advocacy, organisers of the roundtable appealed to political parties to organise credible, transparent primaries to avoid the acrimony that always trails the exercise. She equally admonished prospective voters in the respective states not to allow their votes to be bought.
“We understand that preparations are in top gear in the two states as political parties are inching towards their party primaries and as many interested candidates have collected nomination forms from their various political parties, we urge women to utilise this opportunity to collect nomination forms from their political parties; we hope that political parties will use this opportunity to address issues of internal political party democracy in electing their flag bearers.
“This is interesting as this will in robust issues-based campaigns and of course, we expect transparent primaries to avoid the acrimonious primaries as was experienced during the last general elections leading to several litigations in the courts.
“Citizens of these two states should avoid vote trading and in good conscience and vote candidates of their choice.”
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