A group of observers in the disputed 2019 general elections has urged the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to accept responsibility for the lapses that characterised the conduct of polls instead of attempting to drag the Nigerian Army into the crisis.
INEC national commissioner for Information and Voter Education, Barr. Festus Okoye, had said that collation centres in Rivers State were invaded by soldiers and armed gangs resulting in the intimidation and unlawful arrest of election officials thereby disrupting the exercise.
But, the national coordinator of the Committee of Observers, Prince Richard I. Rowland, told a press conference in Abuja yesterday that the “ridiculous and uncharitable comments” credited to the electoral body were unacceptable because the military’s presence in Rivers State saved the situation from getting out of hand.
Rowland recalled that INEC on Friday, March 15, 2019, blamed the military for the delay in the elections in Rivers State and faulted the assertion of INEC that soldiers marred the elections whereas it was the commission that failed in its responsibility to conduct credible, free and fair elections in the state.
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He said: “It is appalling that INEC would allow itself to be used in a most dubious manner, in cahoots with disgruntled politicians and alien bodies in a wider conspiracy to ridicule the Nigerian military and frustrate its efforts at securing the peace and territorial integrity of the country.”
“In a rush to absolve itself of glaring inadequacies and incompetence in the conduct of the elections in Rivers State, INEC hurriedly commissioned a fact-finding team which was handed a template. In the end, it alluded that the military interfered at the collation centre which was the reason for the delay in Rivers State’s election. It is a treacherous and dubious fabrication from the pit of hell to portray the Nigerian military and leadership in a bad light,” he stated.
The group argued that it was apprehensive that while Bayelsa State government and other stakeholders in the Niger Delta and other states of the federation were commending the Army for its professional handling of the election, INEC resorted to disparaging the Army.
According to him, “It was in fulfillment of its constitutional role that military heeded the desperate call to restore sanity at a collation centre where armed political thugs, many in fake military uniforms, had overpowered policemen and election officers on duty. How could the electoral body be so indifferent to the efforts by the military to secure the collation centre for a peaceful electoral exercise in a glaring chaotic environment that was invested by unruly political thuggery and violence?”
