LG Polls: Akwa Ibom Election Commission Denies Compromising Council Election In Favour of PDP
By Emmanuel Uffot
The Chairman of the Akwa Ibom State Independent Electoral Commission (AKISIEC), Elder Aniedi-Abasi Ikoiwak has refuted the allegation from opposition parties and some well meaning indigenes, that the state electoral commission rigged the just concluded local government elections of October 5, 2024 for the ruling PDP. The AKISIEC boss instead, insisted that it was the best exercise conducted by the Commission.
He emphasised that the Commission conducted the exercise according to the guidelines of the said elections without any interference or external influence by anybody before, during and after pollls.
The Chairman stated this at a two-day retreat organised by the Commission for the board and staff of the Commission last week in Uyo.
He noted that contrary to the insinuations that Governor Umo Eno influence the Commission to be partisan by returning all but one of the 31 council chairmen, the Governor according to him have the commission a free hand to conduct a free, fair and credible elections.
He further commended the Governor for giving them the needed support.
According to the AKISIEC boss, ” in this elections, the Governor did not give us any directive, the Governor at anytime did not call us or send message to any of us concerning the conduct of the elections”.
“There was no directive that this is how I want the elections the be”
“There was no overbearing influence on the side of the Governor, so as a Commission, we owe him gratitude for giving us a free role to do our work”.
Ikoiwak also thanked his Commissioners, staff of the Commission and the ad-hoc staff that were engaged during the electoral process, describing them as the best set of electoral umpires for the Commission.
Speaking further, the AKISIEC Chairman maintained that the essence of the retreat was to assess the just concluded elections and also thanked them for showing what he termed as dexterity and commitment to service.
Ikoiwak “The retreat is to look at what we did well, what we did not do well and how to improve on our future elections”.
He disclosed that the Commission was aware of few petitions in the tribunal and documents would be given to those who made request in the court.
In his goodwill message the representative of International Foundation for Electoral Systems ( IFES), Mr Enyine Victor commended the leadership of the Commission for conducting a credible Local Government Elections in the state.⁰
He assured that IFES will continue to partner AKISIEC to conduct an acceptable pulls and urged participants to take the retreat serious for future engagement.
It is noteworthy that prior to appointment of caretaker committees of local government councils after the expiration of the tenures of local government chairmen and councillors, Governor Eno had insisted that be will not interfere in the coming local government elections and will allow a level playing ground for all aspirants from different parties.
However, the appointment of transition chairmen of the councils have a strong indication that the governor may have gone against his earlier promise as he had input on who becomes the transition chairmen expectedly under PDP.
The unwritten Act in the local government election in the state since the dawn of the current democratic era, that who is appointed transition chairman of any local government area council will surely transmute to elected chairmen.
Indeed, that is what played out as all the PDP candidates in 30 local government areas won.
Curiously but not surprisingly, Essien Udim local government area where the Senate President Senator Godswill Akpabio hails from was won by APC.
The outcome of that local government area election going by the cordial relationship between Senator Akpabio and Governor Eno fuel speculations that, the PDP through the Governor, just decided to allow Essien Udim for Akpabio which based on the permutations PDP would have won to make it 31 over 31.
For the records, PDP won 30 local government areas while APC had one.
However, another dimension to the election which should be gladdening to the womenfolk, is that no fewer than five women have emerged chairmen unlike before which the number was hovering between one and two.
It is due to the landslide victory of PDP, that informed the allegation that AKISIEC rigged the election for PDP which prompted the denial by the state electoral commission boss.
