A Coalition of civil society groups in Abia state are prevailing on the Independent National Electoral Commission to outrightly cancel the results of the April 11 elections in Abia state which were allegedly characterised by malpractices and undue interference by the Peoples Democratic Party.
The group says the Abia state election results released by INEC were not a true reflection of the election outcome but an attempt to subvert the will of the people.
The Coalition led by Comrade David Anyaele, of Centre for Citizens with Disabilities (CCD), accused the PDP stalwarts of thumb printing ballot papers in their homes and snatching ballot boxes.
He said “We demand for total cancellation of the four Local Government Areas, Ugwunagbo, Osisioma, Obingwa and Isiala Ngwa north; not some pulling units or wards in those areas because reports from our teams of observers show there is no elections in these areas.
“With negative public perceptions of the elections in the state and ahead of the rerun, INEC should take every necessary step to protect the integrity of the election as a way of strengthening the trust of the electorate in the voting process and should guide against interference by the incumbent and other political and public office holders,” he said.
Anyaele is calling on INEC to “Deploy the corrupt officers who have in one way or other compromised in the inconclusive election to upheld the commission integrity in organizing a transparent and credible election. The results released in these LGAs are highly questionable due to the level of voter apathy in the gubernatorial election.
The CSO demands;
SECURITY;
Adequate deployment of security personnel’s to the Affected Areas.
Party Agents should be allowed to have access to the ward and Local Government Coalition centers, as this was one of the issues experienced in the last Election where opposition party Agents was not allowed into the coalition centres by the security Agents.
Security Agents and INEC officials in the state who was involved in the controversial Election should be deployed.
OBSERVERS;
We are demanding for the Deployment of independent local and international observers across the country to the areas of the re-run Elections.
CARD READERS;
Emphasis should be placed on the use of the card readers which is utmost paramount importance and the use of the incident forms in the case of the thumb-print authentication fails, as most of the voters in the just concluded polls was disfranchised due to the failure of the card reader and non-usage of the incident forms.
STATE MACHINERIES; State machineries (Local Government chairman, commissioners and other political appointee of the Ruling Party in the State) should not be allowed to meddle or interfere the electoral process from the polling units to the coalition centres,as their activities were evident in the controversial inconclusive Election.
COALLITION CENTRES; Due to the interference by the agents of the ruling party in manipulation of election Results. We demand that coalition centres should be moved out of the Local Government Headquarters to the INEC Local Government Headquarters to avoid the repeat of the same incident in the re-run Election
DELIVERY OF SENSITIVE ELECTION MATERIALS; We demand that Election materials(Ballot paper and result Sheet) must before and after election be scrutinized by the INEC officials, Security Agents and Party Agents with attention on the number of material assigned to each poling units and the remaining/unused ones after the election.
ON THE ELECTORATE
We advocate for massive awareness creation among the electorate through Aggressive media on the assurance of their security ahead of the Re-Run which will encourage the large turnout of voters in these Areas.
