ANAMBRA ELECTION WOULD BE THE BEST SO FAR - JEGA

The chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, Prof. Attahiru Jega Wednesday declared that the November 16
governorship election would be the best election so far in the
country....

Speaking on the occasion of a stakeholder's forum held at the Women
Development center, Awka, Jega said the commission had made adequate
preparation to make sure there was a credible, free and fair election.
However, he appealed to political parties and their candidates to
cooperate with the commission to actualize the goal, adding that the
body would give all the parties and candidates a level playing ground
in the contest.
He said INEC had corrected the controversial voters register earlier
given to political parties after the recent continuous voters
registration in the state which according to him was an error from the
computer that brought out the ages of some voters as 16 years which
would cause a serious problem during the election.
Presenting the corrected copies of the voters register to political
parties, Jega asked them to carefully study them and raise objection
where necessary before the Saturday election.
" We are transparent and we will continue to be transparent and fair
to all the parties.We are human beings and we can make mistakes and
correct them", he said.
" We have concluded the training of our staff, we have introduced
security features to protect our ballot papers and ballot boxes for
every polling unit with a unique code number for each unit so that you
can not take a ballot paper from one unit to another".
On multiple registration, the INEC boss said that the commission had
already arrested some defaulters and were concluding arrangements to
prosecute them and warned voters in the state who had double
registration not to go to the polling units on Saturday as security
agents had been directed to arrest any offender.
Jega warned that there would be no movement of government officials in
the name of monitoring the Saturday election, adding that party agents
must wear INEC tags to enable them enter and stay at the polling boots
assigned to them.
Equally, he advised governorship candidates against going to the
polling booths to vote with their armed aides, noting that it had
caused violenc in the past.