Polls: Police beef up securty in C-River
By Johnbosco Agbakwuru
Against the backdrop of the violence in several Northern states, occasioned by the declaration of President Goodluck Jonathan as winner of the April 16, presidential election, the Cross River State Police Command has beefed up security to forestall any breakdown of peace in the state.
The Commissioner of Police on Election Duties in the state, Mr. Ballah Nasarawa, who disclosed this to newsmen in Calabar, also said that officers and men of the command involved in the ongoing election exercise had been deployed 24 hours before the election day to communities and polling units with difficult terrain.
Mr. Nasarawa said, already the command had arrested 17 persons for different election offences, adding that some of them have been prosecuted while investigations were ongoing on others.
He said though the previous elections in the state were conducted in a relatively peaceful atmosphere devoid of large scale violence, the police faced some challenges which, according to him, included inadequate logistics such as operational vehicles and boats to deploy personnel to polling units.
The CP also said that in some cases, there were delays in commencement of the last election, as the Police and the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, officials in some communities had to walk between four to eight hours to get to the polling units in mountainous Akubueze and difficult terrains.
Nasarawa who was the Commissioner of Police in Kaduna State until his recent deployment to Cross River for the elections, said measures had been taken by the Police authorities to mitigate some of the challenges. He stressed that the command had received more vehicles, boats and fuel to deploy personnel and for escort of official materials.
“We now deploy our personnel and materials 24 hours before elections to communities where we have polling units in difficult terrains. We are also informing the public of the restriction of movement order on time to ensure prompt compliance, which is vital for peaceful conduct of elections.”
Nasarawa who said that the Police did not negatively interfere with the conduct of the elections, appealed to members of the public to go about their lawful business as adequate security had been put in place.
