Opposition political parties on the platform of the Coalition of United Political Parties yesterday raised the alarm on alleged plan by the Independent National Electoral Commission to compromise the forthcoming general elections.
They accused the electoral body of recruiting beneficiaries of the present administration’s N-Power programme as ad hoc staff for the general election.The coalition’s first national spokesperson, Imo Ugochinyere, made the allegation in a statement made available to journalists in Abuja.
Ugochinyere said, “The President wants to use the beneficiaries of their failed N-Power programme to technically rig the election.
“The INEC Chairman should ensure the credibility which he promised Nigerians by making sure that no N-Power beneficiary is recruited as ad hoc staff in the election because it is clear that these so-called beneficiaries are going to be used by President Buhari and his APC cohorts to rig the elections.”
The coalition’s spokesman claimed that the present administration has failed Nigerians and it is clear to government officials that they will lose the election in a free and fair contest.
This, he said, was why they are adopting all manner of ploys to rig the elections.
He added that information available to the CUPP indicated that Mrs Amina Zakari, believed to be a relative of the President would be in charge of the recruitment and training of the wards/local government areas/state collation and returning officers.
“We have just been informed from a very reliable source that Amina Zakari will be in charge of the recruitment and training of the Ward/LGA/State Collation and returning officers.
“This is an obvious effort by Amina Zakari to influence and manipulate the conduct of the 2019 elections,” he said.
Meanwhile, chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Prof. Mahmoud Yakubu, says technology has been able to prevent rigging such that no political party can win an election by a wide margin as was the case in the past.
Yakubu said this on the ‘Osasu Show’ which was posted on the show’s YouTube channel.
He said the Permanent Voter Cards and the smart card readers had been able to tackle rigging, hence the reason for the tightly contested elections in some off-season elections like the Ekiti and Osun governorship polls last year.
The INEC boss said, “Between 2015 and November 2018, we conducted elections into 195 constituencies, the largest number of off-season elections.
“The turnout varied from a little over 50 per cent in Katsina to as low as 2.9 per cent in Ifako/Ijaye in Lagos and 3.4 per cent in Eti Osa state constituency in Lagos.
“I think the thing to say about turnout is that because elections in Nigeria have progressively and incrementally improved, there is no possibility now that you will have the kind of margins that we used to experience in our elections before the introduction of technology — basically the PVC and the smart card reader.
“The elections in terms of outcome and turnout of votes are becoming more international. You can see the outcomes of the elections are becoming more and more competitive and closer to the kind of results we see even in advanced democracies.”
Yakubu said the Commission was ready for the elections, which begin in less than four weeks’ time.