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| Voting In Progress During The Election |
The Committee for the Protection
of Peoples Mandate (CPPM) as a foremost human rights and civil society
organization in fulfillment of its statutory responsibility to humanity and the
good people of Nigeria performed its societal obligation of monitoring the just
concluded local government elections in Ogun state held on the 21st
July 2012.
CPPM personnel were trained by
our sister organization, the Committee for the Defense of Human Rights (CDHR)
in the act of observing elections and thus were deployed to cover the elections
in both Ado Odo Ota and Ifo Lg’s in Ogun state on the day of the election.
Our observers arrived early
enough at 7.00am at the Local government headquarters of both LG’s to observe
the distribution of election materials to the various wards by the Electoral
Officers (EO’s) in the full presence of party agents, observers, media and
security men who were all satisfied with the process which was concluded before
8.00am.
CPPM also monitored the
distribution of election materials from the various wards levels to the polling
units from about 8.00am – 9.32am also in the presence of party agents, poll
observers, security personnel in the two LG’s (Ado Odo Ota & Ifo) which
were concluded to the satisfaction of all.
Actual accreditation took place
in most polling stations observed in the 2 LG’s from between 9.00am – 12.30pm
and we observed that in most polling stations, there were only party agents of
the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) as
well as security agents and we observed that the process went on smoothly to
the satisfaction of all the stakeholder including the electorates.
We also observed that voting materials
were adequate and voting proper started in most polling units in the LG’s at about
12.35pm after the conclusion of accreditation which was announced publicly.
Voting was done by secret ballot in which the voters voted in secret and
dropped the ballot papers in the ballot box which was displayed in the open.
Voting ended in CPPM observed polling units at 3.00pm, after which the ballot
papers were counted and results announced publicly for onward transmission to
the ward level for collation.
CPPM observed the elections in
most polling units in both LG’s and was very satisfied with the conduct of the
election officials as well as the party agents and the security personnel who
were fully on ground to curtail any crisis. We once again commend the deployment
of the security agencies who enforced the restriction order on people as a
security check which contributed in no small way to the peaceful conduct of the
elections in Ado Odo Ota and Ifo LG’s.
But we observed that the election
was not without its shortcoming, such as missing names on voters register, far
distance of polling units from residential neighbourhoods, poor delineation of
wards and polling units which disenfranchised a lot of voters due to no fault
of Ogun State Independent Electoral Commission since they worked with what they
got from the National Umpire (INEC). A lot of voters were disenfranchised in
both LG’s which now has a huge population due to the influx from Lagos State.
A lot of newly developed towns in Ado Odo Ota such as the whole area housing
Bells schools, Ota didn’t have a single polling unit, the same fate befell the
area opposite Canaan
Land, the polling units
in Iyana Iyesi were inadequate for the population and they were not properly
spread. In Ifo Lg, a lot of new towns with a sizeable population have developed
such as Alaja, paramount, etc which didn’t have polling units and so the people
were disenfranchised. These were the major shortcoming of the exercise which
ought to be looked into with a view to preventing a reoccurrence.
Generally the Ogun State Local
Government election held on July 21st 2012 in the two aforementioned
LG’s were transparent, peaceful, fair and credible by all democratic standards
as the electorate exercised their franchise without fear or intimidation.
On the whole, CPPM commends the
good people of Ogun state for a fair turnout of voters, the security agencies,
OGSIEC officials, observers and the media for a job well done in the coverage
of an election in which the conduct of the stakeholders was a marked
improvement even over the conduct of the 2011 general elections.
Nelson Ekujumi,
Executive Chairman,
CPPM.
