1 month ago
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The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), on Wednesday, held a crucial meeting with heads of security agencies ahead of the forthcoming Edo and Ondo State governorship elections.
In a terse statement issued via its official X handle, the commission said the meeting was to strategize and plan for the forthcoming governorship elections as well as bye-elections in some constituencies.
“Hon. Chairman INEC, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, with members of the Commission, held a crucial meeting with members of the Inter-Agency Consultative Committee on Election Security (ICCES) at the Commission’s conference room in Abuja. The focus of the meeting was to strategize and plan for the upcoming #EdoDecides2024 and #OndoDecides2024 Governorship Elections, as well as by-elections in constituencies where vacancies have been announced across various states,” the statement reads.
See more photos from the meeting below:
Earlier, the electoral commission revealed that a total of seventeen political parties are set to participate in the Edo State Governorship election on September 21, 2024.
These parties, according to INEC, have collectively submitted 44,687 agents to the commission through its dedicated portal, which was accessible from July 17 until it closed at midnight on July 30.
This number, however, accounts for only 55.6 per cent of the 80,410 agents needed to adequately staff the State’s 4,519 Polling Units and 211 collation centres, which include 192 ward centres, 18 local government centres, and the State collation centre located in Benin City.
The National Commissioner and Chairman of the Information and Voter Education Committee (IVEC), Sam Olumekun, stated in a release following the Commission’s meeting on August 8, 2024, that each political party participating in the election is required to nominate 4,730 agents.
Notably, only three parties have provided the necessary details for their agents across all polling and collation levels, while one party has not submitted any agents for any voting or collation level.
Olumekun said: “Nigerians may recall that since 2020, the Commission had replaced the manual process for accreditation of observers, media, polling and collation agents with dedicated portals to which the required information, including photographs, is uploaded. Political parties were subsequently required to upload the details of their agents for polling units and collation centres for all elections.
“For the Edo State Governorship Election, the portal opened on 17th July 2024 and automatically shut down at midnight on 30th July 2024 as indicated on item 9 on the Timetable and Schedule of Activities for the election released almost a year ago in September 2023.
“In Edo State, there are 4,519 polling units and 211 collation centres, comprising 192 ward centres, 18 Local Government centres and the State collation centre in Benin city. A political party fielding candidate in the election is expected to nominate 4,730 agents.
“From the 17 parties participating in the election, the Commission expected a cumulative figure of 80,410 agents. However, only 44,687 were uploaded to the portal made up of 43,043 polling, 1,452 ward, 179 Local Government and 13 State collation agents. Put together, the 17 political parties nominated 55.6% of the expected number of agents.”
