By EMMANUEL AZIKEN, Political Editor & EMMAN OVUAKPORIE
LAGOS— THE Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, is considering staggered elections into the National Assembly as an alternative to another postponement of the polls arising from shortage of election materials.

Options before the commission which are to be further examined, today, at a high level meeting of commission officials is coming just as it emerged that INEC has referred the contractor that failed to deliver electoral materials for last Saturday’s National Assembly elections to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC.

The uncertainty surrounding Saturday’s postponed polls is coming against continuing muttering in the commission over the unilateral and sectional slants in operations of the commission under its chairman, Prof. Attahiru Jega.

INEC officials were not just peeved that there was no geopolitical balance in the distribution of contractors for the printing of the election materials, but Vanguard gathered that the commission’s officials were displeased that in reconstituting the operations department, Jega appointed new unit heads without experience. Out of the nine operational heads eight of them were said to come from the North.

Vanguard learnt that the consideration of staggered polls followed disclosures that the logistics needed for the National Assembly polls were, as at yesterday, not in place.

No logistics in place

A very senior official of the commission said yesterday: “As at now nobody can confirm that the election of Saturday will take place because the logistics needed are not in place. So what is under consideration is for staggered polling whereby elections may take place in some selected senatorial and federal constituencies.”

The assertions nonetheless, Mr. Kayode Idowu, Chief Press Secretary to Prof. Jega, affirmed the continuing preparations of the commission for the polls on Saturday.

It equally emerged that a provision in the contract with the electoral material vendors contained a confidentiality clause to protect their identities.

The disclosure of the confidentiality clause came in the wake of reports, yesterday, that an insider in INEC who blew the lid on the contract scheme was being threatened with death threats.

Among the contractors that were reported to have got the N13 billion contracts for the supply of the ballot papers and results sheets were Tip3, a Spanish company; Graphic Inline (Gi); Kalamazoo; Aero-vote; San Frano, a German/Polish company; and VI Solutions. The contractors were reportedly fronted by some Nigerians mostly from the North.

Idowu, however, refused to confirm the identity of the contractors even as he said that the erring contractor had been referred to the security agencies for further investigation and to effect contractual redress.

Noting that INEC had referred the contractor to the security agencies for the purpose of exerting the sanctions, Idowu told Vanguard: “There are terms of the contract that will be applied.

There are sanctions for non delivery and those sanctions will be exerted and I can tell you that the contractor has been referred to the security agencies so that they can also bring their weight to bear in effecting the sanctions. We will hold the contractors that didn’t deliver to the terms of the contract but that will not be done by media trial.”

Vanguard learnt yesterday that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC may have been contacted on the issue. Contacted last night, EFCC spokesman, Mr. Femi Babafemi, said he had heard about the issue but said he could not confirm it.

Avoidable fiasco

Idowu’s assertions, nonetheless, senior officials in the commission were, yesterday, muttering over what they described as the avoidable fiasco they said arose from the unilateral actions of a select few around the chairman in the contract award process.

INEC officials were piqued that all but one of the fronts for the contractors were from the North where Jega hails from.
Idowu was, however, defensive asserting that the contracts went through due diligence process of the Federal Government.

He said: “The truth of the matter is that every contract that has been awarded by this INEC was awarded after due diligence. Through due process, no contract was awarded without passing through due diligence.

“I don’t even know the identity of the contractors. It is not even a matter of disclosure because a clause of the contract is the confidentiality, the confidential nature of the contract and once somebody has defaulted that person will be held to the conditions of the contract.”

He also confirmed that the commission was in a state of readiness to conduct the National Assembly polls on Saturday as he rebuffed insinuations that the exposure of sensitive voting materials may compromise the integrity of the voting process.

Idowu said that the commission was in possession of the voting materials which he claimed were presently being audited, adding that the commission had made provisions to make up for shortfalls.

He said: “The commission is taking an audit on the ballot papers that were sent to the States and wherever there is a shortfall arrangements are being made to make up. The ballot papers that were used were cast as ballot papers into INEC ballot boxes which were brought back.”