The National Chairman of Nigeria's indepen-dent
National Electoral Commission, INEC, Professor Attahiru Jega, yesterday
confirmed the arrest of two INEC Ad hoc staff for carrying out a house-to-house
registration of voters in Kano State.
Weekend Vanguard gathered that the arrest was carried
out with the involvement of eagle-eyed operatives of the Department of State
Service, DSS, and the Police in Kano, Kano State.
The Resident Electoral Commissioner, REC, for Kano
State also confirmed the arrest yesterday.
The arrest was said to have been effected at a Polling
Unit, PU, in the Kabo area of Kano.
The two arrested individuals have, however, been
granted bail.
In fact, Weekend Vanguard gathered from a very
competent source that when the Director General of the DSS, Ekpeyong Ita, got
wind of the development, he was said to have alerted Jega.
The INEC. Chairman, in his response, confirmed the
arrest.
He was also said to have assured that the replacement
for the two staff involved was already on. He confirmed that the arrested
persons were not of the National Youth Service Corp. Shockingly, the INEC
Chairman disclosed that the individuals were students who were being used to
complement the manpower shortage of corp members.
He insisted that the offenders would be prosecuted.
Observers are however, of the view that INEC needn't launch into its now
moribund voyage of adding 30000 Polling Units which were controversially
allocated, giving the North massive advantage over the South, when it was aware
that it had a manpower challenge.
And whereas INEC suspended the allocation of the
controversial additional PUs last Tuesday, inside sources disclosed to Weekend
Vanguard that some Commissioners in the electoral body were still bent on
carrying out an agenda that would accord the North massive voting advantage.
0 comments