Despite the controversy surrounding the need to deploy
soldiers for the forthcoming elections or not, the
Independent National Electoral Commission has
included 19 military Generals and 42 other senior
officers from the Armed Forces in its 428-man Inter-
agency Consultative Committee on Election Security.
The ICCES was established by INEC to review,
coordinate and manage security during the
forthcoming elections in the country.


Other members of the ICCES, according to INEC, are
the Police Force, Department of State Security, Nigeria
Security and Civil Defence Corps, National Drug Law
and Enforcement Agency, National Youth Service
Corps, National Intelligence Agency, Nigeria Prisons,
Nigeria Customs Service and Nigeria Immigration
Service.


Saturday PUNCH investigation revealed that the 428-
man security committee, spread across the 36 states of
the federation and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja,
include a 61-member contingent of Generals and
officers from the Nigerian Army, Nigerian Navy and
Nigerian Air Force.


An INEC document titled: “Information Kit for 2015
General Elections,” made available to Saturday PUNCH,
named the Generals to include Brig.-Gen. Lamidi
Adeosun, who is currently the General Officer
Commanding, 7 Division of Nigerian Army in Borno
State, and who during the week led the military to
recapture Bama, the second largest city in Borno State;
Commodore O. Odumu; Commodore F.F. Ogu; Air
Commodore E. F. Golit; Brig.-Gen J.E.K.Myam; Air
Commodore Charles Oghomiven and Brig.-Gen. J.S
Malu.

Others are Brig.-Gen. A. A. Nani; Air Vice Marshall S. N.
Kudu; Brig.-Gen. A.G. Adeyemi; Brig.-Gen. Osasogie
Uzamere; Air Commodore A. A. Jekennu; and
Commodore Godwin Ochai.
Maj.-Gen. Y. M. Abubakar; Commodore S. A.
Muhammed; Brig.-Gen. A.A. Momoh; and Air
Commodore Omoyungbo are also among the Generals
in the INEC security committees.

The remaining 42 military officers include colonels, lt
colonels, navy captains, captains and majors.
The electoral body stated in the document that the 428
members of ICCES are divided among the 36 states
and the FCT.


It said ICCES in Akwa-Ibom, Benue, Cross River,
Gombe, Jigawa, Lagos, Niger, Ogun and Osun states
are made up of 11 members each. Edo, Ekiti, Enugu,
Kaduna, Kwara have a 10-man ICCES respectively.
Saturday PUNCH investigation also revealed that Abia,
Adamawa, Ebonyi, Imo and Kano states have 12
members inter-agency security committee each
saddled with the responsibility of spear-heading
security during the elections.

While 13-man ICCES will be deployed in Bauchi, Kogi
and Nasarawa states each; a 14-man crack committee
will handle security in each of Bayelsa, Delta, Kebbi
and Ondo states.


Similarly, the security committees in Anambra (17),
Plateau (17), and the FCT (16) lead the park in terms
of membership.

Borno (eight), Katsina (six), Oyo (nine), Taraba (nine),
Yobe (eight), and Zamfara (nine) are in the lower rung
of the security committee membership ladder.
Speaking recently at a forum organised in Abuja on
the Role of Civil Society Organisations, the Media, and
the Police in Mitigating Election Related Violence and
Conflict by the INEC and civil society organisations
under the auspices of UNDP’s Democratic Governance
for Development, INEC Chairman, Prof, Attahiru Jega,
explained that the ICCES was established to ensure a
violence- free polls and enhance voters security during
the elections.


He said, “We are deploying adequate security agencies
to be able to apprehend and prosecute offenders and
the security measures we have put in place have
helped to establish a framework on definite roles of
each agency to avoid a clash of responsibilities.”
The Rivers State Resident Electoral Commissioner, Mrs.
Gecila Khan, who corroborated Jega in an interview
with Saturday PUNCH, said the ICCES made up of
security agencies in the state had been put in place to
ensure security during the elections.

Khan, who spoke through the INEC’s Public Relations
Officer in the state, Antonia Nwobu, explained that the
commission was conscious of the importance of
security during elections, adding that security agents
would contribute their personnel to the committee to
ensure the conduct of a successful exercise.
She said, “The commission is conscious of the
importance of security in conducting effective, free, fair
and credible elections, hence the formation of an
ICCES.


“This body is made up of all security agencies in the
state. The agencies in this committee will contribute
their workforce together under the command and
control of the state. The commission has been visiting
and soliciting their maximum cooperation for the
elections and this has been assured.”


The ICCES had, in a meeting on February 23, 2014 in
Abuja, emphasised the need for a strong military
presence, particularly in the North-East during the
elections. This came up even as the All Progressives
Congress and the ruling Peoples Democratic Party
have been at loggerheads over the legality of deploying
soldiers for the elections.

The Court of Appeal in Abuja, which affirmed Governor
Ayodele Fayose of the Peoples Democratic Party as the
winner of the June 21, 2014 governorship election in
Ekiti State had described the use of armed forces in the
conduct of elections as a violation of Section 217(2)(c)
of the Constitution and Section 1 of the Armed Forces
Act.
It cited and relied on a judgement delivered by Justice
R. M Aikawa of the Federal High Court in Sokoto on
January 29, 2015 barring the use of the armed forces
in the conduct of elections.


But Saturday PUNCH had authoritatively reported on
February 21, 2015 that President Goodluck Jonathan
would not obey the court judgement and would deploy
soldiers for elections.


The Special Adviser to the President on Political
Matters, Prof. Rufa’i Alkali, in an interview with
Saturday PUNCH, had confirmed that military troops
would be deployed to protect the lives and property of
Nigerians before, during and after the elections.


Alkali said, “Soldiers, as far back as when Edo State
Governor, Mr. Adams Oshiomhole, was being elected,
were deployed and Oshiomhole even with his
radicalism swallowed his pride and came to thank the
President for supporting the elections with adequate
security.

“Now, look at what happened in Ekiti State, when they
lost they were crying but when the military was also
deployed in Osun and they won they kept quiet.


“I challenge them to say since they didn’t want the
deployment of security for elections, and soldiers were
deployed for the Osun election, I thought they were
going to reject the outcome of the Osun elections but
they didn’t. What the APC is doing is crass
opportunism.”

Also, Fayose had said Jonathan would deploy soldiers
during the elections, but the APC insisted that two
courts had barred the military from being part of the
exercise.


The Chief Press Secretary to the INEC Chairman, Mr.
Kayode Idowu, in a recent exclusive email chat with
Saturday PUNCH, confirmed that soldiers would play a
role during the elections even though they won’t be
deployed in polling units.

He acknowledged that the military would provide
peripheral security cordon such as manning entry
points into towns to check the trafficking of arms that
could be used to disrupt the elections.

“They are also positioned in covert readiness for rapid
deployment if there is a security crisis beyond the
capacity of the police to handle. The military are never
near polling units,” Idowu added.

According to him, under the platform of the ICCES, the
role of the military has been limited to providing INEC
with logistics support.

This, he said, included Air Force planes and Navy
boats that will transport election materials over
hazardous or difficult terrains across the country.


Investigation by Saturday PUNCH revealed that some of
the Generals have been affected by the recent
redeployment of army officers across the country.
One of them, who asked not to be named by Saturday
PUNCH, confirmed that he had recently been deployed
to Yola to battle the Boko Haram insurgents.

“My brother, we are in a war front here. I’m in Yola
and we are battling Boko Haram here,” he said on the
telephone.

But an INEC source, who craved anonymity, said that
this would not affect the position of the military on the
inter-agency committees across the federation.
“Whoever succeeds the generals in the states they have
been moved from will also replace them on the
committees,” the source said.

However, Brig.-General J.E.K Myam, a member of the
ICCES in Bauchi State, told Saturday PUNCH that all
Army personnel in the state are “battle-ready” to
provide necessary security back-up during the
elections.

Myam said, “Added to the challenges of ensuring
security during the elections, you know Bauchi is one
of the states of the North-East where we are battling
the prevailing security challenges. But we are battle-
ready as far as we know.


“We are like a second tier of security during the
elections. When situation arises which the police
cannot handle alone, we will come in to quell the
situation.


“We will stand by and watch as situation unfolds.
Manning the polling units is the responsibility of the
police and perhaps, the civil defence personnel. We will
be there to back them up when a situation arises
which is beyond their control.”


Meanwhile, a non-governmental organisation, Echoes
of Women in Africa Initiative, on Friday, called on the
Federal Government to provide adequate security for
women during the forthcoming general elections.


The group stated this shortly after a road walk to the
Edo State Government House to commemorate the
2015 International Women’s Day celebration in Benin,
the state capital.


The Executive Director, ECOWA, Louisa Ono-Eihomun,
said that Nigerian women, who were among the most
vulnerable in the society, needed a secure atmosphere
to perform their civic responsibility for national
development.


While calling on the INEC to remain committed to the
March 28 and April 11 election dates, Ono-Eihomun
noted that a further postponement could lead to
violence.
http://www.punchng.com/news/security-19-generals-42-other-senior-officers-for-polls/

JUMP

Apc goons Will start crying fowl, if you ask them why they're crying they won't give you any reasonable point, all you you'll hear them shout is rigging and they forget that nigeria is full of tension and the lives of citizens need to be protected..
like GEJ said he political aims is not the blood of any citizen ....only the guillible will believe Apc fighting for the mass...

I pray it turns out well cos if it does not . . .
Too bad

The presidential election will be declared rigged if APC losses - Fact

Story! Let INEC just provide a level-playing ground and let the election be free and fair! That's all.



Surely,that isn't too much to ask for.

Na so e suppose be

Gej till 2019

Maccoy1:
Apc goons Will start crying fowl, if you ask them why they're crying they won't give you any reasonable point, all you you'll hear them shout is rigging and they forget that nigeria is full of tension and the lives of citizens need to be protected..
like GEJ said he political aims is not the blood of any citizen ....only the guillible will believe Apc fighting for the mass...

Oga. Stop Speaking out of sheer ignorance and hate.
Why won't APC give you any reasonable point??
Is the Ekitigate Tape they took to Court not a reasonable point ??
Is That Not why they Got the court Verdict TWICE(In the High Court and appeal Court) that Military should not be Used in the Elections ?

Abayhormy:

Oga. Stop Speaking out of sheer ignorance and hate.
Why won't APC give you any reasonable point??
Is the Ekitigate Tape they took to Court not a reasonable point ??
Is That Not why they Got the court Verdict TWICE(In the High Court and appeal Court) that Military should not be Used in the Elections ?

what sensible thing have you type now...
Okay you that is full or love nd well is informed, i have just one question for you nd i want a sincere answer...
with the level of insecurity in the north and the pre-election violence raging the south nd east, do you believe the Police will provide security better than the army? Then if ur answer is YES, u don't give a damn about lives nd property. The only thing you care about is Apc winning the election.