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Tag: Troubled areas

  • Insecurity: INEC voices concern over 2023 polls, says adhoc workers jittery of deployment to troubled areas

    Insecurity: INEC voices concern over 2023 polls, says adhoc workers jittery of deployment to troubled areas

    The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has expressed its concern over the possibility of a challenging 2023 general elections especially as the security challenges in the country seem to be on the rise.

    According to the electoral agency, the mounting security challenges and electoral impunity cannot guarantee a conducive atmosphere for the electoral process.

    INEC said the fear of deployment to conflict areas by adhoc staff is worrisome, adding that many of the over one million non-permanent workers, who participated in the 2019 polls, showed apprehension.

    Threats to peaceful elections highlighted by the commission include communal conflicts, farmer/ herder conflicts, insurgency, secessionist agitations, banditry kidnapping, and “plain criminality”.

    However, the agency assured that it would find ways of navigating through the challenges.

    INEC National Commissioner and Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee, Festus Okoye said the challenges are real.

    He said the country must break the circle of impunity, violence and identity theft to have peaceful polls.

    Okoye said: “There will be challenges for the 2023 elections. There will be challenges of heightened insecurity in most parts of the country and the commission must find ways and means of navigating through these challenges. These become difficult in situations where ad-hoc staff members are nervous at being deployed to conflict areas as they are not sure of their security.

    “The country must also break the cycle of impunity accentuated by electoral violence and make our elections as civil as possible. The commission must also find ways and means of populating some of the newly created Polling Units. The commission will therefore, accelerate voter education around the communities and also engage in batch transfer of voters.

    “There is also the challenge of trust and confidence in the electoral process. The commission has increasingly deepened democracy through the use of technology and those that are engaged in multiple voting and identity theft will have a hard time during the 2023 general elections.

    “There are different dimensions to the security challenges in the country. We have communal conflicts, we have farmers/ herders conflicts, we have insurgency, we have secessionist agitations, we have serious cases of banditry, we have breaches of territorial integrity of the country, we have cases of kidnapping and plain criminality in different parts of the country.

    “The commission has offices in the 774 local government areas of the country and we have information on the different problems and challenges in the country.

    “The law gives the commission the power to do all that is possible to enable persons displaced by one challenge or the other to vote. We will remain confident and courageous and maintain robust consultation and engagement with the security agencies in degrading security challenges in the country.

    “INEC has been conducting elections in difficult and challenging circumstances. Presently, we have 176,846 polling units in the country and these polling units must be serviced during elections.”

    Okoye, who recalled that 73 political parties participated in the 2019 elections, said new parties may be registered while some existing ones may be deregistered.

    He added: “During the 2019 general elections, the Commission engaged over a million ad-hoc staff and these staff must be deployed, their allowances paid and they must be housed.

    “As you know, a total of 73 political parties fielded candidates during the 2019 general elections, and the commission printed ballot papers and result sheets for 84 million registered voters.

    “The commission also registered and created polling units for Internally Displaced Persons in various parts of the country and made sure that they voted during the election.

    ”The management and organisation of a political party is a serious venture. In Nigeria, and as far as the commission is concerned, all political parties are equal and have the same incidents of registration.

    “The fact of application does not automatically result in registration. A political association wanting to transmute to a political party must satisfy constitutional, legal, and administrative requirements.

    “Only associations that satisfy that qualifying threshold will be registered. The commission also has the constitutional and legal right to deregister political parties that are not productive. Our resolve is to remain within the context and ambit of the law.”

  • Insecurity: What we are doing to improve operational engagements in troubled areas – CDS Irabor

    Insecurity: What we are doing to improve operational engagements in troubled areas – CDS Irabor

    The Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), Gen. Lucky Irabor, says the Armed Forces of Nigeria (AFN) is currently reviewing its operational engagements in various theatres in order to bring peace in troubled parts of the country.

    This is contained in a statement issued by Director, Defence Information, Maj.-Gen. Benjamin Sawyerr, on Friday in Abuja.

    Irabor made this known at the 6th edition of the CDS security meeting with military veterans in Asaba, Delta.

    The meeting is tagged, “CDS Interactive Session with Retired Senior Military Officers in the South South Geo-political zone”.

    The CDS said the security meeting which began in the South West, has been of great benefit to the AFNaed forces.

    He said the various engagements has guided the military high command in reviewing its operational doctrines and plans.

    Irabor said interaction was a continuous process and that so much value had emerged from the session with the retired senior officers.

    “We are going to leverage the success and benefit to improve on security and safety of lives and properties.

    “The operational engagements of DELTA SAFE which is in synergy with other internal security arrangement are impacting on the peculiar security challenges which are illegal oil bunkering, piracy, among others.

    “The security disposition in the South-South region will continue to get better, “ he said.

    The CDS said the security meeting will focus on engaging critical stakeholders such as royal fathers, some of who were retired senior officers and among the participants to take some tips arising from the interaction in sensitising their subjects.

    He said the military will continue to foster the right atmosphere for other stakeholders to holistically combat the myriad of security threats in the region.

    According to him, there are other engagements that are holding behind the scene, as they have assessed that kinetic efforts is only a part of the solution.

    “There is non-kinetic approach which forms part of the engagement that is focused on the holistic solutions to the challenges in the Niger Delta region,” he added.

    The Chief of Defence Civil Military Cooperation (CDCIMIC), Rear Adm. Fredrick Ogu, said the retired senior officers were in a better position to understand the array of security issues in their domain, and could offer professional counsel on likely strategies to adopt in tackling security threats.

    He said the myriad of security issues in the nation and those specific to each geo-political zone were x-rayed, adding that the outcome of the engagements with the veterans was rewarding.

    Also, the General Officer Commanding, 6 Division, Nigerian Army, Maj.-Gen. Sani Mohammed, commended the initiative by the CDS, saying it would help in enhancing operational performance of the military in the region.