Confusion In Delta over the Expected Take-off of General Elections

[TGD]

THERE was utter confusion yesterday in Delta Central Senatorial District over the expected take-off of the first of the three-legged general elections.

In several towns in Ughelli North and South Local Councils, voters queued up at polling booths faithfully from about 8.00 am until past noon for accreditation to cast ballots without seeing any officials from the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).     

In Ughelli City, Agbarha Otor, Uwheru and Ewvreni in Ughelli North Local Council, Ewu, Arhavwarien, Olomu and Udu, the local council headquarters of Ughelli South, the story was the same, as people went to polling centres but no INEC official was available.

A Peoples Democratic Party chieftain in Ughelli South Local Council told The Guardian on phone at 11.30 a.m. that they had been told that the elections "had been taken care of in the Senatorial District" and as such, they, the party members should go back home.     

The member who holds a post in the local council executive of the PDP but asked not to be named, said that the party had selected those to be awarded votes in the State House of Assembly, House of Representatives and the Senate.

He, however, warned that such selective award of votes should not be done during the gubernatorial election on April 16, as Deltans "would not take it lightly."

In Lagos, accreditation in some wards was already underway before words filtered in that the elections would be postponed.

In Epe, Badagry, Ilado, Magbon Airodrome and Agbara, accreditation had started in some polling centres before information reached them to stop. Even then, prospective voters stayed put at the venues long after INEC had started the official announcement of the shifting of the polls to Monday, to ensure, as Lara Akpo, a mother of two children at Epe put it, "just to ensure that Lagos State polls were not tampered with by those who want to rig."

The closure of land, air and sea borders from noon on Friday for yesterday's election was partially observed.         

At the Seme Border in Lagos, people crossed into Benin Republic as at 6.00 p.m.         

Baba Bose, as he is widely known and a Benin national resident in Agbara, Ogun State, crossed Seme Border at about 6.00 p.m. on Friday en route Cotonu for the burial ceremony of his grandmother.

Asked on phone how he was able to cross the closed border, he quipped: "We know our people at the border. Maybe, they were plainly compassionate or because I was leaving and not entering Nigeria."     

Source: Confusion In Delta