- restates poise for conduct of Saturday election
In fulfillment of one of the Independent National Electoral Commission’s obligations at ensuring a seamless conduct of the general election come 25th of February, the commission has commenced movement of sensitive materials from ththe Central Bank of Nigeria Lagos office to the 20 Local Government Areas of the state.
The movement which was done at the instance of the state security agencies, party agents and military officers set to ensure the sensitive materials are conveyed amidst tight security to the various localities.
The INEC Resident Electoral Commissioner in Lagos, Mr Olusegun Agbaje who superintend the process while chatting with newsmen, notes that adequate measures have been put in place to make the exercise hitch free.
Agbaje said that: “What we have done is to have the ballot papers tagged per local government, the result sheets and other materials also.
“The trucks will be called in two batches and they will be packing after which they will move down to the two local governments, one after the other.
“The party agents are also here, they will follow the trucks to the local governments with the police and other security agencies who are also present likewise the military.
“Twenty vans ready to escort the materials to the 20 local government areas, for other activities we will be doing there.
“The symbolic exercise this morning is to show Nigerians particularly Lagosians that INEC is ready for this election come Saturday 25th of this month.
“We are very much ready, none sensitive materials are already in the local government level, now the sensitive materials by the time they are there other functions will be left to the Electoral Officers over there.
Agbaje hinted that surplus provisions has been made to ensure seamless conduct of the election.
The new Lagos State Commissioner of Police Mr Idowu Owohunwa while reaffirming the poise of the Police Force to provide adequate and tight-prove security throughout the process, note that backups plans are already made to take up the security network at the local level.
“A Component of our election security mandates here fulfilled.
“It does not stop at security provision but covers transit and warehousing of the materials we promise adequate security, at arrival the local police is to upscale security at that level.”
He added that there are no security challenge cited.
The Branch Controller CBN Lagos office, Representative of Director of State Security Services, National and International observers were also on ground to witness the distribution of the sensitive materials.