Rivers Polls: Don’t Withhold Any Election Material, INEC Tells Politicians

Ahead of the National and State Assembly elections in Rivers State, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), has called on politicians to allow the electoral process take place by not withholding any election material.

INEC Resident Commissioner in Rivers State, Aniedi Ikoiwak, who said this during a meeting between the management of INEC and political stakeholders in the state, assured that INEC was ready to conduct a free and credible election in the state.

While cautioning politicians who have plans to frustrate the efforts of the commission, the electoral body noted that accreditation and voting will take place simultaneously during the March 19 elections.

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The Commission also disclosed that the card reader machines will be fully deployed for the re-run elections.

In his words, “Let us all try to play politics as a game. We should try to respect the Law. And to the EOs and others, nobody has the right to withhold any election material. The Law does not allow anyone to do that.

“Our politicians should allow the electoral process to take place. And as far as this election is concerned, I want to say we will use the instruments set by the commission to conduct the election and not the one sent by anybody.

“In this election, we are going to use the new modified system for accreditation and voting. The accreditation will commence by 8am and end 2pm. This election will be done with the full complement of the card reader. That is the position of the Commission.

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“INEC came with incident form to complement card reader but some thought it was to circumvent card reader. This is wrong; incident form is for peculiar situations where fingers were not authenticated.”

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