Ahead of the commencement of next month’s elections, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on Thursday in Enugu State asked politicians, who are preparing to rig the election to bury the idea as the commission had device strategies that would not give room for such.

Speaking during a stakeholders’ meeting with political parties and their candidates in Enugu State, the commission’s Resident Electoral Commissioner, Prof. Chukwuemeka Onukaogu said this year’s election would not be business as usual.

He expressed dismay that electoral irregularities had dealt a big blow to the nation’s electoral exercises in the past years, stressing that for the country to be able to enthrone good governance; it must be able to first address the electoral process.

“It is not going to be business as usual; that era is gone for good.
Anybody, who is planning to engage in any form of rigging is merely deluding himself as the strategies already device by the commission would checkmate such anti-democratic practices.

“If we must live like our counterparts in the developed nations, then good governance should be the norm and this cannot be attained if we do not have a viable and credible electoral process that commands national and international acceptability,” he said.

He said the commission had acquired enough card readers that would serve all the electoral booths across the country, and therefore urged politicians to campaign vigorously to get the support of the people, as there would be no short-cut to getting victories at the election.

On the raging controversy over the poor distribution of the Permanent Voters’ Card (PVC), Onukaogu said the commission had taken steps to ensure that all electorates have their cards.

He said despite the initial challenges that trailed the distribution of the cards, the commission had recorded 77 per cent distribution, expressing hope that before the end of the month, all the PVCs would have been fully distributed.

Also speaking, the Commissioner of Police in the state, Abubakar Adamu, said the police command were ready for the election and advised those who are thinking of fomenting trouble to look elsewhere as the state would not be conducive for them.

On his part, the gubernatorial candidate of the opposition, All Progressive Congress (APC, Okey Ezea expressed satisfaction with INEC’s readiness, noting that with what was on ground, the coming elections would be largely credible.

He however raised the alarm that the ruling PDP, had devised fresh strategies that would aid rigging as some officers of the INEC not hand over bulk PVC to PDP members to distribute to their members, while those of the opposition are left to lament.

Highlight of the stakeholders’ meeting, which attracted chairmen of the PDP and APC, in the state, Ikeje Asogwa and Ben Nwoye respectively, as well as other party leaders was a demonstration by the Head of the Commission’s ICT, Mr. Nnaji Chukwuemeka on the workings of the card readers and the PVCs.