The Northern Patriotic Front (NPF) has condemned late night voting in Ede South and Ede North during the recently concluded Osun Governorship Election.
The NPF was one of the Independent National Electoral Commission-accredited Civil Society Organizations tasked with election monitoring.
The group urged the electoral umpire to look into the matter in order to prevent it from happening again.
It also stated that security had been relaxed in some areas of Ede, stating, “Between Sekona roundabout and Edunabon, there were no checking points nor patrol of any security personnel in that axis.”
An 18-page report signed by its administrative secretary, Rasheed Shuaib, and submitted to INEC, also found vote buying in some of the polling units its members visited.
It urged Nigerians to join the fight against vote buying rather than relying solely on CSOs and anti-graft agencies.
It also accused security personnel of colluding in some of the polling places visited by its members.
“Some of the political parties were seen to have compromised the security agents in some of the polling units visited by our members.”
“In some polling places, there are separate male and female lines.” “In some polling units visited with less than 800 registered voters, two BVAS were deployed, while in other polling units with the same number of registered voters, one BVAS was deployed,” the group noted.
The CSO stated, “According to the electoral guideline, the official close of voting at polling units is 2:30pm.”
Voting was completed at various polling units across the State by 2:30pm, as reported by NPF observers, in accordance with the electoral law as amended in 2022.
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“However, this was not followed in some polling units in the Ede axis, where voting continued until around 9:00 p.m.” This clearly violates a provision of the Electoral Act. This anomaly was also reported in the media by other observer groups’ analyses.
“The conduct of the election in Ede South and Ede North should be investigated to assist the Commission in preventing voters from being admitted to the queue after the stipulated time,” the group said.
The two local government areas where late-night voting took place were strongholds of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Ademola Adeleke, who eventually won the election.
It will be remembered that Ismail Omipidan, the spokesperson for Governor Adegboyega Oyetola, the candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, decried late-night voting in the two local government areas in question during an interview on Channels Television a day after the election.
