Osun rerun: Be impartial, group urges INEC
Impartiality
By Taiye Agbaje
Abuja, Sept. 26, 2018 (NAN) A civil rights activist, Joe Okei-Odumakin, on Wednesday called on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to be impartial in the conduct of Thursday’s governorship rerun election in Osun.
Okei-Odumakin, who is the President, Women Arise for Change Initiative, also called on the electorate in the affected polling units to freely exercise their voting rights without fear or favour.
She made the call in a telephone interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja.
‘’We urge INEC to be impartial, dutiful and allow the people to freely exercise their franchise without any infringement,” she said.
She said since it was within the powers of the electoral umpire to call for the elections, ‘’we hope that the political actors will play by the rules of the game.”
‘’It is also hoped that the peaceful atmosphere that we witnessed during the main election last Saturday will be allowed during this supplementary poll, by the political parties and other stakeholders involved in the process,” she added.
On whether she will be monitoring the election, Okei-Odumakin said: ‘’A team of 28 Women Arise observers, to be led by myself, are being deployed to observe the election across all the polling units where the supplementary elections will be taking place tomorrow (Thursday).”
NAN reports that INEC had declared the governorship election in Osun inconclusive following the thin margin of votes scored by the two main contenders.
The rerun election scheduled for Thursday in Osun is to hold in seven polling units across four local government areas.
The Returning Officer and Vice Chancellor of the Federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA), Prof. Joseph Fuwape, said Sen. Ademola Adeleke of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) scored 254,698 votes, while Alhaji Gboyega Oyetola of the All Progressives Congress (APC) scored 254, 345 votes and Sen. Iyiola Omisore of Social Democratic Party (SDP) followed with 128,049.
Prof Fuwape said: “Based on the results collated by the Returning Officer, the margin between the two leading candidates is 353 which is lower than the number of registered voters in the affected areas.
The extant law and INEC guidelines and regulations provide that where such a situation occurs, a declaration may not be made. (NAN)
TOA/AMY
Edited by Abdullahi Yusuf