PDP registered 8,000 militants for Edo polls, alleges Oshiomhole

*IGP Assures Of Maximum Security During Poll

Edo State Governor Adams Oshiomhole has restated that some governors in the South-South have perfected plans to rig the governorship election in the state.

He further alleged that about 8,000 militants from those states are now registered for the September 28 election, which was earlier scheduled for today.

Speaking while receiving the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Mr. Idris Ibrahim, at the Government House, Benin City yesterday, Oshiomhole said: “In line with my tradition, I have always tried to speak out on any matter that I am worried about. I first raised this alarm on the eve of INEC Continuing Voters’ Registration exercise, but these criminals, who are determined to perpetrate violence and deny us the beauty of a peaceful election, unable to find local participants, have chosen to import these militants with the support of two or so of my brother governors.

“Happily, our ever vigilant, the peace-loving electorate were able to apprehend some of these people from other states for the purpose of this exercise. At least, 13 of them were handed over to the Police.”

He continued: “Having done that, we are clear that there are a lot of people, up to 8,000 of them who are non-resident or indigenes of Edo State, but indigenes and residents of Delta and Rivers states and some other states in the South-South, some from Bayelsa State, who have registered for the sole purpose not to swell the votes, but to be present in various locations on election day.

“As part of the processes they put in place to effect this, they had conspirators in INEC that made available to them data capturing machine in the residences of various opposition leaders. We shared these experiences with the Police and the DSS.”

Earlier, Ibrahim said: “We are on a working visit. We have come here to interact with our officers and colleagues from other security agencies to see that the election we are having in a few days’ time is carried out in a seamless manner.

“Within the Police, we are deploying 25,000 reinforcement to the command, compose of conviction Police officers, mobile Police officers, counter-terrorists, marine Police and air wing.

“We are going to deploy air support to the people on the ground, with a medical team also, including the waterways. And we are bringing some reinforcement of gunboats to support our patrols on the water.

“This obviously we are doing to ensure that this election is provided maximum security. We are very serious about this election. The men are going to report about three days to the election date and this will enable them to take care of most of the flash points in the state. We expect that on the election day, we are not going to record any problem.

“On that day, we are going to restrict movement and since it is going to be a joint operation, any personnel, whether from the Police or military that we see moving outside the area of responsibility to come and dabble into elections here, we have given our officers on the ground the mandate to arrest them, so that we deal with them departmentally.