Seye Ojo, Ibadan
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), yesterday, said the intervention of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) gave credibility to the 2019 general elections.
Resident Electoral Commissioner(REC) in Oyo State, Mr Mutiu Agboke, stated this in Ibadan during a thank-you visit to the Ibadan Zonal Office of the anti-graft agency.
He said the monitoring of vote buying and selling in the last general elections across the country prevented the exercise from being compromised.
Agboke, thanked the acting Chairman of the EFCC, Ibrahim Magu, for collaborating with the electoral body to help discharge its duties to the satisfaction of most Nigerians. Said Agboke: “I was monitoring the analysis of the elections on the radio one day when somebody said he saw for the first time EFCC men around Oluyole area and Ibarapa axis.
Your intervention in the 2019 elections is not something that can be wished away. In fact, it gave credibility to the conduct of the elections
“Your own computation during the collation was even more superb than what we were doing. I discovered that each time we were showing the results, the EFCC was telling us the margin between all of those figures. We thank you very sincerely. We thank all your personnel,” he said.
Agboke said INEC had started preparing for the 2023 elections, noting that “the commission is gong to start the process of Continuous Voters Registration (CVR) very soon.”
“Those who were unable to register will register. Those whose cards are still in our custody will be able to come and collect their PVCs. As I speak, we have over 700,000 PVCs uncollected,” he said.
In his remarks, Mr Friday Ebelo, the Ibadan Zonal Head, commended the staff of the electoral body for putting Nigeria first in the discharge of their duties.
According to him, “all public servants should make such commitment their watchword in order to end well in their chosen careers.”
“I always tell my people that as the head of an agency of government or leader of a people, you must always remember that you have a name to protect,” said Ebelo.
“That should be the motivation for you to stand your ground at all times. If you want to be compromised, you can be compromised. But if you can remember that you have a name to protect and you have a tomorrow ahead of you, you will guard against being compromised.”
He said the EFCC was ready to offer any assistance to help in sanitising the country’s electoral processes.