Osun State Independent Electoral Commission (OSSIEC) chairman Barrister Hashim Abioye on Wednesday, assured citizens of the state, that robust security arrangements had been put in place for the upcoming local government election.
Barrister Hashim gave the assurance while answering questions during the 38th Edition of the Frontliners by the League of Veteran Journalists in Osun State at the NUJ press Center in Osogbo
According to him, “there is adequate security arrangement in place for all stakeholders and citizens during the electoral process and assured that the exercise would be a fraud-free one.
He added, “the commission timetable had been adjusted to allow for more inclusiveness. We are not rushing at all; we are prepared for the election”.
“In the next couple of weeks, we will start recruiting ad-hoc staff and training those staff members because it is germane to the electoral process. We will carry all relevant stakeholders along in the election.
The commission Chairman who hinted that, all stakeholders to participate in the electoral process had been appealed to, to play the game according to its rules, affirmed that, “Our primary goal is to ensure a fraud-free and violence-free election, and we are working towards that.”
“OSIEC has designed a program called the Campaign Against Election 2CD, which stands for Cybercrimes, Cultism, and Drug Abuse. If these three issues are properly addressed, there will be no violence during the election, and OSSIEC is up to the task”.
“I assure you that the security arrangements we have in place are top-notch, and you will appreciate them by the end of the day. When IPAC raised some allegations against us, I said they did not conduct an independent investigation before making those allegations against us”.
“We resolved the issue within 24 hours after their research.They raised an alarm because they thought there was a communication gap between us. After their independent investigation, they realized that we were not hiding anything.”
” All 18 political parties in Osun State are participating in the upcoming election, and we are guided by the due process of law.”
“You will see that our arrangements are not rushed. Before the recent Supreme Court judgment was even conceived, let alone filed, we had already issued a notice of election. When the judgment came, we had to adjust in relation to the notice of election and the elections to be conducted”.
In his submission, the former commissioner, Independent National Electoral Commission INEC, Dr. Jimoh Agboola, applauded the effort of the commission, saying that it’s the only state commission that is doing the right thing in the whole of Nigeria
He said, “Electoral process is not an event, it is a process that you will think of security, stakeholders, funding and many more must be properly integrated on the day of election, if personnel are not properly trained effectively there will be a problem.”
“The commission should please take care of all the component of the circle and I’m sure we will have a brilliant election, this is the first time one OSIEC is doing the right thing in Nigeria.”
The chairman of LVJ, Prince Adepoju Atobatele appreciated the chairman as he shared light of concerns of the citizens on the forthcoming election.
