Last Saturday’s local government election in Nasarawa State was the second time the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC had to face an electoral challenge in the state. The first was the party’s primaries which took two weeks before the results were announced.

The outcome of the primaries did not go down well with many of the chairmanship candidates who alleged imposition of candidates by Governor Tanko Al-Makura and his allies.
It was not surprising that most of the aggrieved chairmanship candidates defected to the Peoples Democratic (PDP).

By Abel Daniel

LG unexpected hitches
After long preparation, the Nasarawa State Independent Electoral Commission (NASIEC) postponed the council elections thrice due to insecurity in the state. Thus, the exercise was expected to be free from any form of hitches on the side of the commission.

However, last weekend, the opposite was the case as electoral materials could not leave the commission office until 1.00 pm even though voting was to begin at 8.00 am. No explanation was given by the commission for this late distribution of electoral materials.

Gov. Al-Makura

Gov versus deputy
The local government election was also the first time that the governor and his deputy, Damishi Barua Luka, who recently decamped from the APC to the PDP had an opportunity to square up against each other.
The showdown was much expected because a number of Al-Makura’s political appointees defected with the deputy to the PDP.

Mr. Luka, reacting to information that the APC had planned to rig the election, warned sternly that any attempt by the Governor and APC to rig the election would be vehemently resisted by the PDP insisting that the game must be played according to the rules in order to avoid further crisis in the state.

Late polling
Elections in most of the local governments started at the about 4.00pm. Governor Almakura cast his vote at exactly 3.30pm in Lafia. Asked by news men whether he was comfortable with the delay in the kick start of the election, he said: “The late take-off of the election is as a result of due diligence by the NASIEC to ensure that no hitch is recorded at the end of the day. We don’t need to just jump into the election when certain process necessary for a credible election is to be followed. We should not look at the delay here and there but the process. From what I gathered, the election is going to be completed before night fall.”

Most of the polling units had shortage of result sheets. In places like Akwanga where Senator Ewuga cast his vote, he lamented the absence of result sheets for councilors, saying that the people in his ward said they will not vote until those materials were on ground.

In Akwanga, the electoral umpire declared the results inconclusive on the ground that there were no election in four wards, namely, Akwanga North, Akwanga South, Gudi and Andaher which amounted to about 300,000 voters.

In Nasarawa local government the home town of the State House of Assembly, Hon. Ahmed Mohammed where the PDP was said to have been leading earlier, the election was also declared inconclusive. It was reported that the returning officer disappeared and could not be found as electoral officers at the polling units were all waiting to compile results.

“I personally called the NASIEC chairman myself to lay the complaint on what was happening and he told me that everything shall be properly settled” the speaker said.

The state electoral umpire earlier hinted journalists at a press conference on Friday that elections would not be conducted in areas affected by crisis in Awe local government that was deserted particularly by Tiv farmers due to carnage meted on them by Fulani herdsmen. The APC was declared winner in the local government.

House summons NASIEC boss
Amid the confusion, the state House of Assembly, on Monday, summoned the NASIEC chairman to clear some of the controversial issues bothering on announcement and interpretation of the actions of some returning officers.

Appearing before the house on Tuesday, the lawmakers questioned the authority of the NASIEC chairman to announce results contrary to the provisions of the electoral law that stops the chairman from announcing election results. Results, according to the law are only to be announced by the presiding officers, then the returning officers at the ward level and local government only.

Member representing Obi, Hon. Obande Anthony said, “your action by erring has created a security threat to the entire people of Nasarawa State in failure to confirm the results from Akwanga, Obi and Nasarawa local governments”.

But the chairman replied that a doctrine of necessity could be adopted in certain circumstances to save a nation from crisis, and that was exactly what he did.

On why Akwanga, Obi and Nasarawa local government were declared in conclusive while result of the elections from the various ward and local governments were declared by the presiding and returning officers in those tree local governments, the chairman said he was under pressure from some forces which compelled him to declare the results in those local governments inconclusive. He pleaded before the House that he erred by doing that as the NASIEC chairman.

Hon. Anthony said he monitored every process of receiving the election results before declaring the result but there was no security threat in any way.
The chairman replied that security report detailed to him was that the situation in Obi could ignite crisis even though he was not there in person, and therefore he decided to declare the result inconclusive.

Hon. Baba Ibakwu representing Odeghe Nasarawa constituency also testified that materials were thoroughly distributed with all the electoral staff fully on ground at the various wards. They however moved the result to Nasarawa. While in Nasarawa the returning officer who helped in fixing the electric light because it was dark, said he wanted to pray as muslim. That was the last time we saw him only for us to hear that he was already in Lafia.

“We were there with the DPO, SSS, and Civil Defense till 10 pm. We met you and told you all that happened. You called the DPO in our presence and he told you that they were still waiting for the returning officer, and you said you already have some results of Nasarawa with you already. The DPO told you who brought the results. Because the results are still here while the returning officer said he wanted to go and pray but disappeared” Ibaku testified.

Ibaku added that the results are still in the custody of the police in Nasarawa local government, and warned that if anything happened in Nasarawa local government the first person to be questioned is the NASIEC chairman.
Responding to Ibaku, Dr. Modibo Abdullahi said the same situation prevailed in Obi and Akwanga, stressing that security threat to returning officers was what happened in Nasarawa local government hence the declaration of the election as inconclusive.He urged those aggrieved to take their complaints to the tribunal.

Blaming some of the returning officers, Modibo said “while recruiting a person into a job you would not know who he is until he starts the job. Some of the professors acted like small babies, it’s an issue of conscience. Some professors are without conscience”.

In conclusion, Hon. Francis Orogu Enokela moved a motion that the NASIEC chairman and his team having accepted that they erred and that they are going to release the results as it is, should be given opportunity to go and clear the air which is translated to mean that the results of the three local government declared inconclusive should be announced before the end of today being Tuesday. And where they failed to do the right thing the members of the assembly shall take over to do the right thing.

The motion was seconded by hon. Philip Aragio, member representing Akwanga south constituency.