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The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Lagos State
said 6, 609, 115 residents were eligible to vote in the 2019 General
Elections in the state.
Mr. Sam Olumekun, the Resident Electoral Commissioner disclosed
this at a workshop on Lagos State Election Security Strategic Plan for
2019 Elections.
The workshop was organised by Nigeria Policing Programme (NPP) in
collaboration with INEC in Lagos State. Prince Adelani Asade, the
Administrative Secretary of the commission delivered Olumekun’s speech
at the workshop.
Lagos state has 245 Registration Areas (Wards), 8,462 polling
units, and 3669 voting points across the 20 Local Governments of the
state and Olumekun agreed that security is key to holding a successful
election.
“6, 609, 115 eligible Nigerians registered to vote during the 2019 general elections in the state.
” I am profoundly grateful to NPP for organising this very
important and timely workshop on elections security considering the role
of good security structure in the conducting a peaceful and successful
general elections in 2019.
” It is crucial to say that with 91 political parties and about
74 million voters geared to take informed decision and action at the
general elections in 2019, the security of election officials,
materials, and the electorate is of utmost importance to the commission.
“Indeed, security is key to the conduct of credible elections.
INEC in Lagos is truly proud of partnering with NPP at this most
auspicious time in the electoral cycle, ” Olumekun said.
The INEC commissioner commended the NPP and hoped that the workshop
would give the commission the opportunity to review, reflect,
brainstorm, and re-engineer its security structure and strategy.
He added that the commission’s proactiveness on security, had
informed regular meeting of the Inter-Agency Consultative Committee on
Election security where matters concerning security before, during and
after elections were discussed.
Olumekun said INEC would improve on the conduct of elections in
2019. In his goodwill message, the representative of NPP, Mr Emeka
Ukaotu said that INEC would need to develop its election security
management plan.
According to him, some factors needed to be considered by INEC in
developing the plan. These include relevant intelligence and information
about locations and assessment of vulnerability.
He urged INEC to also consider previous history of electoral offences or allegations associated with the geographical area.
Ukaotu said the commission should also consider the potential for
offences to be committed as a result of lack of policing, ill-prepared
local authority, complacency and political culture.