ETIM EFFIONG
The proactive disposition of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) which resulted in overt and covert deployment of personnel to Ekiti State for a hitch-free gubernatorial election has been applauded by the State Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), Dr Tella Adeniran Rahmon.
This was made known when Acting Deputy Commandant General Operations (Ag. DCG Ops), Haruna Lawal Muhammed, paid a visit to the REC at INEC office during election monitoring duty in Ado Ekiti, Ekiti State.
The REC said that he was impressed as NSCDC officials were deployed in real time to polling booths which opened early for accreditations and commended the corps leadership for mobilizing large numbers of personnel to participate actively in the security training organized by INEC and identification of possible flashpoints for peculiar attention among other landmark duties.
The Ag. DCG operations assured that the corps would continue to work closely with INEC and other sister agencies to ensure a hitch-free election process. Reiterating that the Corps is doing its best to secure INEC permanent and ad-hoc staff, electorates, election observers as well as sensitive and non-sensitive election materials in the state.
“The turnout for the election is impressive in most polling units we have visited and reports received from other Local Government Areas also revealed that voting is going on smoothly simultaneously; NSCDC is fully prepared to protect the people and Critical National Assets, our reserved personnel are on standby in case of any emergency and when the poll closes, our men on the ground would be deployed throughout the night, to ensure 24 hours security coverage of the state,” he said.
The Acting DCG operations called on residents to maintain orderly conduct after exercising their franchise and refrain from violence when the votes are counted as the corps had deployed intelligence officers to possible flash points for effective intelligence gathering and management of security situation.
In the meantime, two persons have been arrested in Ado Local Government; one in connection with vote buying while the other was arrested in connection with thuggery to disrupt voting at a polling unit.
