The Oyo State Local Government election held last Saturday proceeded on the basic assumptions that it will not turn out to be the same across the country that is always characterized by electoral commissions favouring the ruling party. The recently concluded election, according to the time line set by the Oyo State Independent Election Commission (OYSIEC) was to commence at 8:00 a.m. and conclude at 3:00 p.m. meaning that the election officials would have arrived before this time with adequate materials along with the assigned security personnel before the commencement.
At the polling units, polling agents with their individual political party tags on, are expected at each of the political units with election observers to observe the processes. Also expected are the voters who are supposed to file up for accreditation before the electoral officers to be accredited, meaning that they will show up with their voter cards and be identified from the voters’ register, with their names ticked, thumbs marked and issued the valid ballot papers for voting before being shown the seperate cubicle from where they are expected to mark the party of their choice in secrecy and fold, ready for dropping into the ballot boxes provided for the purpose. The voters were expected to leave the voting stage either to go home and come back later when the election has been concluded and the votes are ready for counting and wait for the declaration of results.
Alternatively, the voter may decide to wait until when the voting would have been concluded to be counted and announced. Thereafter, the votes are to be put back into the ballot boxes after all the necessary result forms have been completed and verified. The forms are handed to appropriate officials, that is, political party agents, observers and security officials.
The originals are then used to wrap the counted ballot votes and put back in the ballots boxes locked as instructed, ready to be safely transported to the appropriate collation centre. However, my observation is that these official ideals were not strictly followed during Saturday election.
Ordinary and sensitive materials were handed over to election officials very late and it became pretty difficult for the hired vehicles and the assigned officials to navigate their ways to their apportioned polling units. They arrived their polling units very late after the security agents and voters waited for hours.
The actual accreditation did not start until after 11am in most polling stations. The place where the election started early was in the ward where the governor cast his votes. In some cases, the late arrival was adduced to the hired vehicles not being mobilised early hence were not able to navigate their ways to the voting units they were posted.
The local government council election saw some violations of electoral rights and abuse of electoral board regulations.
There was non presence of electoral officers and non delivery of ballot boxes at some dedicated wards and polling units denying voters the opportunity to vote. Voting did not take place in several established polling units. There was no tight security on the roads leading to the polling booths in various wards and little efforts to enforce the movement restriction announced by the government and OYSIEC. The movement restriction order was not effectively enforced as vehicles freely moved in and out of the towns across the State. Also, there were reported cases of violence and threats that scared voters away from voting units.
It is very evident that with the results of Saturday’s election as declared by the electoral management board (OYSIEC), it is apposite to stress the fact that the integrity of state electoral commissions will continue to be doubted as long as they are appointed by the sitting governor.
Comrade Mashood Erubami, an activist, writes from Ibadan.
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