Mike Igini, resident electoral commissioner of Akwa Ibom state, says local government elections in Nigeria are nothing but organised crime.

Speaking when he featured on Politics Today, a
Channels Television programme, Igini said the kind
of people who come into politics sometime
determine the outcome of an election while
alleging that interference at the grassroots
affect the conduct of elections.

“Look at the local government system in Nigeria.
We have lost 774 local governments in Nigeria to
every sitting governor of the 36 states in
Nigeria,” Igini said.

“Local government elections are nothing but
organised crime. They should not be calling them
elections at all. They are nothing but coronation
ceremony that we have across Nigeria and
Nigerians are not doing anything about it; that
you have lost your LG, that there is no democracy
taking place there.

“Because what constitutes free, fair and credible
elections with respect to INEC-conducted election
is different from the local government.”

Igini said INEC has made remarkable progress in
the conduct of elections even though it is not
where it ought to be.

He said the use of public viewing portal used
during the governorship elections in Edo and Ondo
states removed possible electoral fraud as
Nigerians saw the results of each polling unit
online almost immediately after casting their
votes.

“I can confirm that INEC has made tremendous
progress. The INEC of today is no longer the INEC
of before because, since 2011, the kind of
elections that we have conducted had a
remarkable departure from where we used to be
even though we are not where we are supposed to
be,” he said.

“The INEC public viewing portal is a new innovation
to deal with the recurring issues of vote changes
and that was why it was introduced at the level of
collation to ensure that at the polling unit once
result is declared it should be sent to the viewing
portal so that Nigerans can see it.

“The way we are going.. I am very sure not too
far from now, it is INEC that will have to declare
results, we will publicise result… that is, where we
could do what the CNN do in America by making
progressions. That is where we are going.”

He also said the political elite are the greatest
threat to Nigeria’s democracy as politics is now
“the biggest business in Nigeria”.

“The problem we are having is that the political
elite are the greatest threat to our democracy;
they are in disarray. They are the ones attacking
both the hardware and software of INEC inorder
to bring about credible election,” he said.

“They deploy violence to win elections. Politics is
now the biggest business in Nigeria, everybody
wants to go into politics because the incentives
are so high and the political parties have failed to
mobilise people around issues that matter and the
fact that what you take home as a politician is so
high and people are now desperate, meanwhile, it
is supposed to be about service .

“We have to do something about it.”

https://thecable.ng/akwa-ibom-rec-lg-elections-are-organised-crime

Indeed, they are a sham

The truth and absolutely the truth.

The 774 LGAs have been have been certified dead on arrival and the burial date is what we are waiting for.

NGF should communicate the LGA's funeral arrangement to us as event unfolds

True

Different day, same s.hit. Ain’t nothing new