Rivers moves to resist attempts to rig polls

As the Rivers State citizens await decisions of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to come up with modalities for the rerun elections in the State, Governor, Nyesom Wike, has said the people would make it impossible for the commission and security agencies to manipulate the exercise towards any predetermined goal.

Following the inconclusiveness of the elections to the State Assembly and National Assembly in Rivers during the 2015 polls there had been plans and rescheduled plans to repeat the elections without success.

The governor however warned INEC and her cohorts that any plot to transplant the Edo State rigging model in the rerun national and state legislative elections in Rivers would not only fail but “our people will resist them.

Wike stressed that INEC and security agencies will not be allowed to use the Edo governorship election model in Rivers State.According to him, “Anyone planning to steal the people’s mandate in this state will be resisted, as nobody can intimidate us.

“I hear some persons celebrating that they will repeat what they did during the Edo State governorship election here in Rivers State. Somebody can say anything but nobody will use the police or any other security agencies to rig the rerun elections in Rivers. If you want to take our mandate by force, you will go by force.”

The governor charged all the people of Rivers to remain vigilant, as INEC may want to take them unawares.It would be recalled that the political atmosphere in Rivers had remained under tension since the 2015 general elections. Subsequent moves to repeat the exercise on March 19 did not yield the desired result.

The proportion of chaos that was witnessed in Rivers state with scores of persons killed and injured forced the commission to reschedule the exercise.

INEC has consistently said that violence has been responsible for elections being inconclusive. The Commission explained that as long as the environment remained insecure it would not conduct the rerun elections, as it was not prepared to risk the life of any staff.