The president of Nigeria voters assembly (VOTAS), Comrade Mashood Erubami, has blamed politicians for the inconclusive elections which held in Bayelsa and Kogi states. The human rights activist, said the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) was really prepared for elections but “it is not only the commission that would make the election credible as expected. Each of the stakeholders is expected to play its role in accordance with the Constitution and Electoral Act. The police, political parties, contestants, voters and the media need to collaborate with INEC before elections could be free, fair, peaceful and legitimate.”
“What happened during the elections were not expected. We had thought our experiences in if the 2015 general elections would have elevated the understanding for how elections should be better conducted. The incidence of violence was not expected with the assurances given by the police coupled with the huge number of police and other security agencies deployed,” Erubami noted. Erubami told the New Telegraph that the razing of INEC building by thugs shows that the high number of security agencies being deployed is not to protect voters and voting materials but a means of claiming allowances for those who participated and their big bosses.
He said: “It is on record that all the atrocities committed during the elections were not by INEC but by the police due to their actions and inactions against unofficial election observers and politicians who armed the thugs to unleash terror.” The VOTAS boss stressed that “as an election observer, what the INEC was expected to do were seen to have been done in terms of arrival of voting materials, adequacy of materials, workability of equipment at the voting centres and conducive voting atmosphere.
He further debated that what made things to go out of place was not that the people invited were incapable of carrying out the assigned task, but that they (INEC) were sabotaged by unscrupulous politicians. Meanwhile, news developments have been emerging from Bayelsa, following the turmoil that characterised the guber elections. Ex-militants under the aegis of Forum of Spokesmen of Ex-Niger Delta Militant Group, have issued a warning to the Nigerian Army, stating would resist any attempt to militarise the state. The threat comes on the heels of the cancellation and rescheduling of election in Southern Ijaw local government area of Bayelsa state by INEC.