Fred Ezeh, Abuja
With a little over a month till the Bayelsa State governorship election, the governorship candidate of the Democratic Peoples’ Congress (DPC), Seiyefa Fetepigi Eches, has suggested that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) conduct the polls using an electronic voting system.
The candidate advocated for electronic voting system as being more efficient, reliable and reduces human to human interaction, which in most cases, tampers with the credibility of the electoral process.
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She insisted that the electronic voting system would be a total departure from the current system where card readers malfunction, leading to the use of compromised incident forms that encourages electoral malpractices, rigging, underage voting, over voting, falsification of results and violence.
In a statement made available to Daily Sun in Abuja, the DPC candidate appealed to the INEC, political parties and other stakeholders to imbibe issues-based politics and eschew actions that would cause violence and possible loss of lives.
Eches said that the people of Bayelsa are more than ready to resist any attempt by political party or INEC officials to thwart the mandate of the people.
She urged the youths to remain law abiding and refuse to sell their votes and conscience for a mess of electoral porridge from “use and dump” political buccaneers masquerading as democrats. “The era of voting buying is over in Bayelsa State,” she said.
The candidate congratulated the Federal Government and Nigerians on the country’s 59th Independence Day anniversary, and renewed calls for better policies and programmes that would herald a better life for Nigerians.
“Undoubtedly, the state of Nigeria is bad. There is too much suffering in the land, despondency, hunger, insurgency, militancy, banditry, kidnapping, armed robbery, ethnic rivalry, division, confusion and agitation for secession which pose a threat to the survival of the nation,” Eches said.
