THE Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the police have assured Nigerians of a hitch-free governorship election.
They gave the assurancee yesterday during a stakeholders’ meeting on the election held at the Prof. Dora Akunyili Women Development Centre in Awka.
Those at the meeting included the INEC chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu; the Inspector- General of Police, Alkali Usman Baba, the Resident Electoral Commissioner for Anambra, Dr. Nwachukwu Orji, the Co-convener of the National Peace Committee, Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah, and others.
The Anambra governorship election will hold this weekend.
In his address, Yakubu noted the commission’s areas of preparedness for the election.
He stressed that the electoral umpire is determined to prosecute perpetrators of electoral malpractice including the commission’s staff on election duty.
Yakubu disclosed that the commission would deploy the Biometric Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) device and assistive devices for Persons With Disability (PWDs) to ensure equality in voting.
He said: “This is to guard against voting by identity theft where one person uses another person’s Permanent Voter’s Card (PVC) to vote using the incident form. With this development, the use of the incident form is abolished.
“No voter without a genuine Permanent Voter’s Card (PVC) will vote. No voter who has not been successfully accredited electronically using the BVAS will vote.”
In the same vein, the IGP said security operatives would be deployed to Anambra for the election.
He assured the public that the deployment was not designed to intimidate the citizens but to curb activities that would undermine the process.
Baba said: “It is to also serve as a strong warning that the government is determined to bring such subversive characters to justice should they advance their ignoble, undemocratic, and unpatriotic intents.
“The overriding objective of our operational action plan is to ensure an environment that is peaceful enough to encourage the law-abiding people of Anambra State to exercise their electoral franchise.”
