Onyebuchi Ezigbo in Abuja
A civil society group, the Situation Room, which monitored the just concluded Ekiti State governorship election, has said that it observed incidences of vote buying and selling during the exercise.
In a statement issued by the Convener of the Situation Room, Eneh Obi, the group said that vote buying during the Ekiti election followed a familiar pattern of similar incidences across the country, and in particular the 2014 governorship election in Ekiti State.
“The description of this phenomenon as ‘stomach infrastructure’ in the 2014 election has evolved into a new nomenclature now described as ‘See and Buy’.
“The ability of Ekiti politicians to make light of such a grave violation of extant law is most unfortunate. Situation Room strongly condemns this blatant violation of the electoral law,” she said.
Situation Room however said that the election was generally peaceful, with voters playing a key part in the peaceful election environment.
The Situation Room also commended voters for their comportment at the various polling centres.
It noted that the Independent National Electoral Commission’s (INEC) strategy of voters’ redistribution failed to address the problem of over concentration of voters in some polling units.
According to the election monitoring group, a glaring example was the situation at Surajudeen School, Ado Dallimore (Ward 9), Ado Ekiti LGA, which had about 5,000 registered voters shared between just two polling units.
Also it said that some of the voters complained that their request for transfer of registration to their preferred polling units was not approved before the exercise.
