INEC decries electorate’s apathy in Anambra The Resident Electoral Commissioner, REC, in charge of Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, Anambra State, Prof. Chukwuemeka Onukaogu yesterday condemned the prevalence of electorate apathy in the state. Onukaogu identified three major reasons why the phenomenon of electorate apathy exists in Anambra. According to him, “the excessive use of security personnel during elections at the polling units, wards and local governments collation centres usually terrorise the people and makes them very insecure to cast their votes. Also, he said the electorate in Anambra are disillusioned by the attitudes of politicians who rather than address issues during their campaigns, engage in character assassination. The third reason, he said, is that the average electorate before 2011 had no confidence in INEC. He spoke to journalists during the kick-off of a twoday Joint INEC-IFES voter education workshop for civil society organisations, community-based organisations and people living with disabilities in Awka on Thursday. Onukaogu, who said that the workshop is part of the activities aimed at conducting a hitch free governorship election on November 16 promised that the commission will ensure that security personnel deployed for the election conduct themselves in ways that will not infringe on the safety and security of the electorate. He regretted that the practice of character assassination by politicians heats up the polity and breeds fear among the electorate. Speaking on the import of the workshop, Onukaogu said: “In this voter education exercise, we hope to address the above issues so that both the politicians and electorate will have the mindset that will promote the conducive atmosphere needed for the kind of election we want to conduct this year.” He stated that it was a fact that before the last election was held in 2011, the confidence which the public had for INEC degenerated so much that people had genuine fears that their votes are usually not counted and if they are counted, they do not count when final results were being released. Assuring the electorate that their votes would count this time, the REC contends that: “We want to assure the electorate in this state that this time around, their votes will be counted.”
Posted on: Fri, 04 Oct 2013 11:43:06 +0000
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