Low turnout mars Benue LG polls

Elections into the 23 local government areas of Benue State on Saturday witnessed voter apathy across most polling units in the state.

Our correspondent who monitored the exercise observed that apart from low turnouts in some polling units, voters were not particularly enthusiastic as most of them went about their normal businesses.

The exercise, however, was generally peaceful, even as commercial and social activities went on unhindered.

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Earlier, the Benue State Independent Electoral Commission (BESIEC) announced April 30, 2022 as new date for the council elections in the state initially scheduled for May 7, 2022.

BSIEC’s Chairman, Tersoo Loko, at a press conference preparatory to the exercise, said some of the political parties billed to participate in the election included All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Social Democratic Party (SDP), Labour Party (LP) as well as the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

Our correspondent reports that, the All Progressives Congress (APC) had earlier said it would not take part in the elections.

Also, the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) in Benue, claimed it just heard about the polls from media reports and would not be participating.

The party’s spokesman, Sam Agwa, in a statement, noted that, “in view of NNPP’s reorganisation and relaunch processes across Nigeria since 2021 we had no luxury of time to seek to participate, and or challenge the process par Benue State Independent Electoral Commission (BSIEC) guidelines, or other “legalities”. Consequently we have no candidates at all levels in supposed polls for tomorrow (Saturday).”

Meanwhile, the Acting Chairman, Forum of State Independent Electoral Commissions of Nigeria, Barrister Jossy Eze, who spoke to journalists in Makurdi while monitoring the elections, said he particularly noted that voters were not intimidated into voting.

He said, “So far, the places we visited I noticed that the election was peaceful; there is general voter apathy as regards the number of voters, viz-a-viz the number we have seen from the ballot boxes.

“Although, the turnout is low, there is still time, people are still ready to vote and people will still come to vote, since the closing time would be at about 4pm and this is midday.

“We also noticed that the atmosphere around the polling booths are conducive for people to come out and vote, no intimidation, but surprisingly we do not see party agents and we also do not see enough security personnel.”