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INEC
Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu (R)
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The Independent National
Electoral Commission on Thursday in Abuja said that it had fixed December 10
for rerun elections in Rivers State.
The
Punch report continues:
The
announcement, which was made by the Secretary to the Commission, Mrs. Augusta
Ogakwu, came a day after the Senate threatened to abandon plenary if the
commission refused to organize the election and other rerun elections in the
country before December 10.
The
Senate had said that the refusal of the electoral body to conduct the elections
was depriving the people of the areas involved of having representatives in
both chambers of the National Assembly.
Though
INEC said it was not moved by the threat of the boycott of the plenary, it
however said that the fixing of the dates for the elections was done after what
it described as “extensive consultations.”
Rivers
State does not have a single senator in the Senate, while the state still has
some vacant seats in the House of Representatives and the state House of
Assembly.
Apart from
Rivers State, Ogakwu said that the commission would conduct elections in Lagos
and the Federal Capital Territory.
The
commission stated that election into a vacant seat in the House of
Representatives from Lagos State and the councillorship election in the
FCT, according to Ogawku, would hold also on December 3.
The
commission had on Wednesday demanded an undertaking from political parties that
they would not cause any mayhem anytime it fixed the rerun elections in Rivers
State.
It
said there was no way it would be able to conduct a free, fair, credible and
acceptable election in the state when political parties were not ready to sheathe
their swords.
The
Chief Press Secretary to the Chairman of the commission, Mr. Rotimi Oyekanmi,
stated the commission’s position in an interview with our correspondent.
Oyekanmi
said though the commission appreciated the Senate’s concern, the electoral body
did not need the ultimatum before doing the right thing.
He said, “If you can recall, there was an election in March this year in the state during which violence was unleashed on our officials.”
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