SECURITY ALERT WITH JIDE

INEC urges NASS to expedite action on establishment of Electoral Offences Tribunal.

Chairman, Independent National Electoral Commission, Attahiru Jega has called on the National Assembly to expedite action on the establishment of the Electoral Offences Tribunal.

Jega who made the call in Abuja said there was an urgent need to revisit the Justice Mohammed Uwais-led Electoral Reform Committee's recommendation on the establishment of the tribunal.

He expressed worry that laws on electoral fraud were not being applied, but said INEC was determined to apprehend electoral offenders and ensure that there was enough evidence to prosecute them.

Jega said the laws should be reviewed to provide for additional sanctions.

He noted that many Nigerians were becoming indifferent to elections because they believed that the staff of the commission would collude with people to undermine the process.

The chairman said the mission was studying the court judgments and would make any employee identified either by name or office to face the law.

Jega added that no staff would be allowed to do anything illegal or fraudulent.

The chairman expressed optimism that with what INEC was doing, the confidence of Nigerians in the electoral process would be restored.

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NSCDC plans to deploy 6,500 officers for Delta re-run election.

No fewer than 6,500 officers of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) will be deployed to work with other security agencies to ensure the Jan. 6 Delta re-run election succeeds.

The NSCDC Commandant in Delta, Amos Andekin,who gave the figure in an interview said that the command would deploy 3, 500 of its officers, while 1,000 officers each from Edo, Anambra and Bayelsa states would join his men.

He explained that two officers would be assigned to each of the quiet polling units, while more than two officers would be deployed in volatile units located in areas such as Warri and Asaba.

The commandant explained further that he had appealed to the Bayelsa command of NSCDC to place 300 officers on stand-by, and another 50 each from Edo and Anambra.

Andekin, however, said that the deployment of the officers would be a challenge.

He said it would be a challenge because the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Delta had said it would not provide any other logistic support apart from feeding the officers.

According to him, mobility will be one of the major challenges before the corps as it does not have vehicles with which to transport the officers to the units they are deployed to.

In a related development, Luka Ikpi, Sector Commander of the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), has said that 130 officers of the command would be on ground to guarantee smooth flow of traffic.

He said that the officers would also ensure that the movement of vehicles was restricted until after the re-run election.