…Says 97% polling units commenced voting by 9:30am

The Executive Director of Yiaga Africa, Samson Itodo, has described voting in the ongoing Osun State governorship election as largely peaceful and seamless, but raised concerns over alleged vote buying and intimidation of election observers.

Itodo, who spoke at Ward 04 Unit 10 at Ataoja, Osogbo Local Government of the state, on Saturday, said the civil society organisation recorded the commencement of voting in 79 per cent of polling units where it deployed observers, based on its representative sample across the state.

He added that by 9:30 a.m., accreditation and voting had commenced in 97 per cent of the polling units monitored by the organisation.

According to him, the early opening of polling units was commendable, particularly against the backdrop of logistical challenges faced by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) following a late court judgment.

“In the polling units we have visited, the process has been seamless and peaceful. People are present and security agencies have also been deployed to the polling units,” Itodo said.

He, however, identified vote buying as one of the major concerns observed by Yiaga Africa during the exercise.

“The major issue we have observed across the state so far is the incidence of vote buying. In some of the polling units we visited, we observed voters openly revealing how they voted. In other cases, voters did not reveal their choices,” he said.

Itodo said the development remained one of the critical incidents recorded by the organisation, although he maintained that the election had generally been peaceful.

He urged all stakeholders to sustain the peaceful conduct of the exercise, particularly as the process moves towards the collation of results.

“We are now approaching a critical stage of the election, which is the collation of results. That is where we are very concerned that things could go wrong,” he said.

The Yiaga Africa director also expressed concern over reports of intimidation of election observers by party agents, describing such incidents as unacceptable.

He said observers played an important role in strengthening the credibility of the electoral process and should be adequately protected by security agencies.

“Security agencies also need to recognise that observers are here to ensure the credibility of the process, and they need to provide adequate protection for them, especially when party agents attempt to disrupt or prevent them from performing their duties,” Itodo said.

He disclosed that one of Yiaga Africa’s partner organisations had reported that one of its observers was allegedly intimidated by a party agent and chased away for minutes after being deployed to monitor the election.

Itodo urged security agencies to investigate such allegations and ensure that observers were allowed to carry out their duties without intimidation or interference.

He also noted that the election followed a highly competitive campaign period characterised in some instances by violence and inflammatory rhetoric, stressing the need for all stakeholders to maintain peace throughout the voting and collation processes.

According to him, the security agencies had so far conducted themselves professionally, urging them to maintain the standard and remain neutral throughout the exercise.