Adamawa Guber: INEC denies partisanship allegation

The Independent National Electoral Commission has dismissed partisanship allegations in some dailies against its staff during the Adamawa State supplementary election that produced the incumbent governor, Ahmadu Umar Fintiri as winner.

Reacting to the allegations in a statement which was signed by the National Commissioner in charge of Information and Voter Education, Barrister Festus Okoye on Thursday in Abuja, he explained that the deployment and redeployment of its staff during the impasse was normal with the INEC.

He said, it has been a long time tradition of the umpire during off season and supplementary elections, adding that its staff never held any meeting with officials of Adamawa State government as was being insinuated.

The statement reads: “The attention of the Commission has been drawn to a Press Statement by a candidate in the recently concluded Adamawa State Governorship election in which officials deployed for legitimate duty in the State were alleged to have undermined the electoral process after a discreet “nocturnal” visit to the Government House and ostensibly met with one of the candidates in the election who gave them a list of “collation and returning officers” deployed for the election.”

The INEC said, it didn’t want to join issues with partisan actors, but for the sake of clarity, it insisted that no such meeting took place nor any list of Returning and Collation Officers handed over to anyone, while those behind the reports were reminded that all officers working on elections are put under oath.

The Commission further clarified that there was only one Returning Officer who has been appointed to do his work in the full knowledge of the Resident Electoral Officer in the State, hence, the notion of partisanship cannot arise.