Bamigbola Gbolagunte, Akure

The Ondo State Independent Electoral Commission (ODIEC) has fixed December 1, 2018 for councillorship and local government elections in the state.

The commission also released guidelines for the polls which it said would be conducted in all the 18 local

Chairman of the commission, Mr. Yomi Dinakin, announced the date and issued the guidelines at a stakeholders meeting held in Akure, the state capital, on Thursday.

Dinakin, however, ruled out the use of card reader machines during the conduct of the elections.

He said the law setting up the commission has no provision for the use of the machines for the conduct of its elections.

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Apart from the legal barrier, the ODIEC boss said Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) didn’t release its card reader machines for the use of state electoral bodies.

Dinakin also explained that the logistics of the commission could not accommodate the use of the machines during the forthcoming polls.

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“Using card readers is expensive and the time for the training of manpower is short and expensive. But I am assuring the people of the state that the election will be a success.

“If we follow the rule, we will conduct free, fair and credible election. I am assuring you of our neutrality. We are not going to be tele-guided,” he said.

According to the guidelines, each chairmanship candidate is to pay nomination fee of N50, 000 while each  councillorship standard bearer is expected to pay N20,000.