The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Edo State office, on Friday, harped on the need for Nigerians to act rightly and criticise persons behind electoral violence.
Obo Effanga, Edo State Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), who made the call during a post-election review meeting with journalists in Benin City, opined that persons who disrupt elections do not commit it on their own accord but are sponsored by politicians.
“The quality of what we do is a reflection of us as a people because all the people who were involved in the elections were Nigerians. The people who conducted the elections were Nigerians, the people who contested the elections were Nigerians, the people who disrupted the elections were Nigerians, the people who shot people during elections and the people who reported the elections were Nigerians. So, it is for us as Nigerians to decide and act the right way at all times.
“And If people disrupt elections, they didn’t just stand on their own to do it, somebody recruited them to do that. Who are the people recruiting them to do that? The same people who are supposed to be the beneficiaries of the process, the politicians. We need to call this people out,” Effanga said.
The resident electoral commissioner equally pointed out that the duties and powers of the resident electoral commissioner do not include counting, tabulation of votes, recording of results, annoucement of results or declaration of winners.
“So, if elections are conducted in the field and the votes are counted there by the presiding officer and recorded in the result sheets, there is nothing the REC can do even if you say there was a mistake or a deliberate falsification of information at that level.
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“It will go to the collation centre, the collation officer at the ward will have to be satisfied that what has been presented as the result at the polling unit is accurate before he or she admits it into collation. Once the person has admitted it into collation and has collated it, it now moves to the next level of collation. So, at every level, the persons who can correct whatever anomaly in there starts with the presiding officer, it then goes to the ward collation officer who has the opportunity to correct it.
“If that is not corrected, it then goes to the next level depending on the nature of the election. It could go to the local government collation officer. If it’s the presidential election, it comes to the state collation which has the state collation officer and it is not the REC. The REC only supports the process but the person who collates the results and take the decision is usually the university don appointed by INEC,” he added.
