The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on Tuesday lamented that the spate of attacks on its facilities may be a harbinger to a national crisis, if left unchecked.
This was contained in a statement issued by the National Commissioner and Chairman of its Information and Voter Education Committee, Festus Okoye, in Abuja.
This was after a meeting between the INEC Chairman, Mahmood Yakubu and President Muhammadu Buhari in order to redress the various challenges.
Okoye noted that the INEC Chairman relayed the statistics of the attacks and the intent behind them.
He said, “The Chairman of the commission, Professor Mahmood Yakubu and other national commissioners met with the President, His Excellency Muhammadu Buhari today June 1, 2021 and briefed him on the spate of attacks on the commission’s offices and facilities nationwide and their implications for elections and electoral activities in Nigeria.
“The chairman pointed out that there have been 42 cases of attacks on INEC offices across the country since the 2019 general elections.
“He further informed the President that from the frequency of the most recent attacks, they appear to be systematic, coordinated and targeted at future elections. The intention, he pointed out, is to incapacitate the commission, undermine the nation’s democracy and precipitate a national crisis.”
According to Okoye, these attacks have huge ramifications regarding the “challenges inherent in targeting the offices of the commission and bringing down its facilities including the huge investment in building the national electoral infrastructure and the difficulty in replacing them in the immediate and in the future.”
