As the voting exercise in the ongoing governorship election in Osun State gradually comes to an end, politicians and loyalists of candidates have been adopting different strategies to protect the cast votes and ensure the people’s will prevail.

Findings by our correspondent revealed that many political party chieftains in major strongholds have retained the presence of voters at polling units with a bid to preventing ballot box snatching.

In many of the polling units monitored, many party chieftains have been engaging the services of accredited conventional security personnel “they trust.”

“I have to make some calls for a team of DSS to be drafted here. Now that they are here, I am more at peace. I plead with them (security personnel) to wait till the votes are counted and moved to the Collation Centre because I don’t trust the security agents deployed here,” a party chieftain, who did not want to be named confided in our correspondent.

For others, many youths have been mobilised to keep watch over cast ballots and other sensitive materials.

One of the agents of the popular political parties in the state, who did not want to be named, said, “The election will soon end here and there is tension. They know we are winning here and they may want to scatter our votes. So, I have asked our party youths to stay behind and keep watch.”

The Guardian had reported skirmishes, ballot box snatching and shooting at Irewole Local Government Area and in Ejigbo.