INEC ad-hoc staff protest over unpaid allowances

Some ad-hoc staff of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) who participated in the recent general elections in Lagos yesterday staged a protest to demand payment of their allowances.

The aggrieved staff were those of the Oshodi-Isolo Local Government who were at the INEC office in the local government. Carrying placards and singing solidarity songs, they accused the INEC electoral officer in the local government of withholding their allowances. Comrade Nelson Samuel who spoke on their behalf said they were demanding payment of their training and inconvenience allowances for the cancelled election, presidential and governorship elections.

The spokesman of INEC in Lagos, Femi Akinbiyi, however said the commission had paid over 90 per cent of the ad-hoc staff, adding that those who were yet to receive their payments must have submitted wrong account numbers.

He also exonerated the electoral officer who the protesters accused of withholding their money, saying the money was not with him but with INEC’s account domiciled in the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).