CSO Decries Late Night Voting During Osun Guber

The Northern Patriotic Front (NPF)  has faulted what it called late night voting in Ede South and Ede North in the just-concluded Osun Governorship Election.

NPF was one of the Independent National Electoral Commission accredited Civil Society Organisations to monitor the election.

The group urged the electoral umpire to investigate the matter with a view to forestalling future occurrence.

It equally noted that security was relaxed in some parts of Ede, saying, “Between Sekona roundabout and Edunabon, there were no checking points nor patrol of any security personnel in that axis.”

An 18-page report signed by its administrative secretary, Rasheed Shuaib, a copy of which has been submitted to INEC, also observed that there was vote buying in some of the polling units its members visited.

It urged Nigerians to join the fight against vote buying and not leave it to CSOs and the anti-graft agencies alone.

It equally accused security operatives of compromise in some of the polling units its members visited.

“In some of the polling units visited by our members, the security agents were seen to be compromised by some of the political parties.

“In some of the polling units, there are separate queues of male and female. Two BVAS were deployed to some of the polling units visited with less than 800 registered voters while in some other polling units with the same number of registered voters, one BVAS was deployed,” the group noted.

On the late night voting, the CSO noted, “According to the electoral guideline, the official close of voting at polling units is 2:30pm.

polling units visited and as reported by the NPF observers, voting was concluded at various polling units across the State by 2:30pm in accordance with the electoral law as amended 2022.

“However, this was not followed in some of the polling units in Ede axis where voting was still going on till around 9:00pm. This is clearly against the provision of the Electoral Act. This anomaly was also reported by some other observer groups’ analysis in the media.

“The conduct of election in Ede South and Ede North should be investigated to assist the Commission in preventing admitting voters to queue after the stipulated time,” the group said.

The two local government areas where late-night voting occurred are strongholds of the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Ademola Adeleke, who eventually won the election.

It will be recalled that Ismail Omipidan, spokesperson of Governor Adegboyega Oyetola, who is the candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, had during an interview on Channels Television a day after the election, decried late-night voting witnessed in the two local government areas under reference.