Emmanuel Thomas l Tuesday, Feb. 19, 2019
ABUJA, Nigeria -Chairman, Independent National Electoral Commission(INEC), Professor Mahmood Yakubu has said that the position of INEC is that electoral violators should be dealt with in line with the provision of the electoral act.
Yakubu, was responding to questions based on the utterance of President Muhammadu Buhari that would-be ballot box snatchers will die at a press conference at the International Press Centre in Abuja.
He said that the house of any INEC commissioner was never raided by the security agencies, neither were six directors of INEC invited by the SSS as reported by the media.
He said no third parties were involved in configuration of smart card readers. “They are done entirely by officials of the commission, so there is no way vendors outside will be involved in the configuration of Smart Card Readers”, he said.
He said the commission will continue to protect and jealously guard the independence of the commission. On demonstrations in some of the regional offices of INEC, he said that in a democracy, people have the rights to demonstrate provided they are orderly.
He said elections will take place in Borno state and in states were people reside in camps. “Like we did in 2015, we will allow people in the camp to vote like in 2015 unless there are new development”, he said.
He said the commission is unaware that results sheets are in the wrong hands, adding that all sensitive materials hitherto sent out have been retrieved, and currently in the vault of the CBN and that the commission will do everything to ensure that its staff are kept out of harm during and after the election.
