The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Kebbi state has
urged politicians to be wary of social media posts after voting prior to
the official declaration of result by the commission.
The resident electoral commissioner (REC) in the state, Alhaji Ahmad
Mahmud, gave the advice during an interactive session with stakeholders
in Birnin Kebbi on Monday.
“Fake news is now a trend and can mar our efforts to ensure free, fair and credible elections.
“We urge you to be wary of social media posted results before official declaration.
“Only INEC returning officers at wards, local governments and state
levels have the statutory authority and power to declare the results,”
he said.
He said that 1,938,171 permanent voter cards (PVCs) were received from
INEC headquarters out of which 1,860,239 were distributed, leaving
77,932 PVCs unclaimed.
“We have all the sensitive materials at CBN custody, so we have no fear for the materials now.
“I collected the remaining sensitive materials that we had been awaiting
for and by Wed, Feb. 20, we are going to start distributing them to
remote areas and by Friday 22.
“We hope to finish the distribution in all the 21 local government areas of the state.”
According to him, the state has 225 wards, 1,345 voting points and 2,398 polling units in the 21 local government areas.
“We still maintain our arrangement as we had earlier told before the
postponement that, we are going to use 520 vehicles in the
transportation of ad hoc staff and election materials.
“This is part of our arrangement with the National Union of Road
Transport Workers (NURTW), Federal Road Service Corps (FRSC) as well as
security agencies on transportation.”
He assured that INEC was determined to ensure free, transparent and fair
elections but urged the people to continue to pray for successful
conduct of the exercise.
The REC said that special arrangements had also been made to take care
of physically challenged persons to enable them exercise their franchise
without hitches.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that the stakeholders at the
interactive session were security agencies, representatives of political
parties, traditional and religious leaders as well as various NGOs and
CSOs.
