The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, has published a booklet containing information on party agents for Bayelsa, Imo and Kogi governorship election.
INEC National Commissioner and Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee, Sam Olumekun said this when he unveiled the booklet in Abuja on Tuesday.
Mr Olumekun said that the publication was part of INEC preparations for Saturday’s election.
“The information booklet contains infographic summary of registered voters and Permanent Voters’ Cards (PVCs) collected by Local Government Areas (LGAs) as well as the distribution of registered voters by gender, age group, occupation and disability.
“The publication also includes the list of candidates and detailed information on the two polling units in Bayelsa and 38 in Imo without registered voters.
“The Commission has repeatedly said that elections will not hold in these polling units. No materials have been produced for these locations and no officials will be deployed to them,’’ Mr Olumekun said.
On the list of polling and collation agents for the election, Mr Olumekun said that some political parties don’t have agents in some states, in spite of sponsoring candidates for the election.
Sixteen political parties fielded candidates for the election in Bayelsa and 18 in Imo and Kogi.
The election will be held in 10,470 polling units (excluding the 40 polling units without registered voters).
Mr Olumekun said that each political party was expected to nominate polling agents for all the polling units as well as 649 Ward, 56 LGA and three state collation centres.
“However, at the close of the deadline for uploading the list of agents to the INEC dedicated portal by political parties, 34,704 agents were uploaded for Bayelsa.
“Also 65,274 for Imo State and 37,995 for Kogi, making a total of 137,973 polling and collation agents for the three states.
“However, the detailed breakdown shows that not all the parties nominated agents for the polling and collation centres across the states.
“Indeed, some political parties have no polling unit or collation agents in some States despite having candidates in the election,’’ he said.
Mr Olumekun said that the information booklet as well as the comprehensive summary of the agents and their distribution by polling units as well the ward, LGA and state collation centres had been uploaded to INEC website.
He added that the publications had also been uploaded on INEC social media platforms for public information.
NAN
