By Mike Oboh
The Independent National Electoral Commission , INEC has been challenged to ensure the progress made with improvement in its conduction of the just concluded Edo State Governorship election are deepened and sustained during the forth coming Ondo State election. Nigeria Civil Society Situation Room in its interim reports made know to the media on Monday in Abuja said that though the efforts of the electoral body was commendable during the election, it will be key to sustaining such development if it can be replicated in Ondo state. Speaking on behalf of the body, its convener, Clement Nwankwo said the overall election in Edo State was violence free to the relief of the stakeholders who had feared that the violence laden rhetoric of the election participants could pose a threat to peaceful elections. “it is noteworthy that the efforts at mediating peace and reducing political tension mounted by INEC, the Police, the National Peace Committee, the Benin monarch, the Oba of Benin and civil society groups paid off. These peace efforts commend themselves to future elections,” Nwankwo said. He also called on INEC to deepen and expand the use of its Elections Results Viewing portal in order to increase the transparency of the country’s elections. Nwankwo said while the electoral body should also deserved commendation for introducing the COVID 19 protocols to address the public health concern caused by the crisis of COVID 19, the body urged INEC to ensure a greater effort at enforcing the protocols ahead of future elections. He said the incidence of vote buying during the elections was hing, and called for a more effective enforcement of election laws that prohibit vote buying and other elections ton offenses. The Situation Room called on the National Assembly to move quickly and urgently proceed with legislative action to ensure the passage of the the Electoral Torah Offences Commission Bill that creates a body to enforce respect for election laws. He said the body noted the professional conduct of the police and some security agencies deployed for election duty, adding that security personnel wore identification tags and intervened to resolve disruption that arose in some voting locations. He said they also received reports of some military personnel harassing and intimidating citizens, including election observers and mounted roadblocks around the vicinity of collation centers in Edo North Senatorial District, firing of gunshots and generally being disruptive of the work of election observers seeking to participate in the collation process.
