How Osun polls was conducted without violence------group

 Emeka Ibemere

The Osun State governorship election have come and gone without the expected fear of violence witnessed in the election conducted on August 9, 2014.

It beats the imagination of the political pundits who had earlier predicted crises in the election because of its build-up to the main election, but the careful handling of the polls by the stakeholders and the contestants made Osun election, violence free. It’s on this background that the CLEEN Foundation, with support from the Justice for All (J4A) Program of DFID, and Eastern Union, commend Nigeria Police and other security agencies for their resolved efforts in handling a peaceful election.

According to CLEEN Foundation, in line with its commitment to contributing to effective election security management, with support from the Justice for All (J4A) Program of DFID, observed the conduct of security officials, during the Osun state gubernatorial election held on Saturday 9 August 2014.

Valkamiya Ahmadu, Senior Program Officer, Public Safety and Security said the organisation’s observance as done in the previous elections was what gave them the platform for the organisation’s healthy report on the Osun election.

“ As done in previous elections across the country since 2011, CLEEN Foundation implemented a number of integrated activities aimed at contributing to public safety and security during the election in Osun State. First, it conducted a pre-election security threat assessment to identify potential security risks, flashpoints and mitigating factors to those threats”, the reports stated.

 He said the finding of their assessment was shared broadly with the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the leadership of the Nigeria Police Force, other security agencies and civil society groups.

“Second, it organized a one day training workshop on election security management for all the Divisional Police Officers and other senior officials under the Osun state police command. The workshop was also attended by representatives of the Osun State Resident Electoral Commissioner and the leadership of other law enforcement agencies”.

According to him, it provided a forum to share useful ideas on how to effectively police the election and generally ensure safety throughout the exercise.

“Third, CLEEN Foundation published abridged versions of the Police Service Commission’s Guidelines for the Conduct of Police Officers on Electoral Duty in two national dailies, widely read in the State. The publications also contained the contact numbers for the call centre it had set up to collate complaints and incident reports from the public on the conduct of security officials during the election”, the report further added.

“Lastly, CLEEN obtained accreditation from INEC, recruited, trained and deployed observers in all 30 local government areas (LGAs) in Osun state to observe the conduct of security operatives on election duty”.

According to the Foundation, their commendation statement sums up the preliminary findings of the organisation’s observation exercise.

“The gubernatorial election conducted in Osun State on 9 August 2014 was contested by candidates of 20 political parties. However, it was essentially seen as a race between the candidates of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) and the incumbent All Progressives Congress (APC)”

Going through the Foundation’s observations, the group discovered that there was security presence in the State of Osun during the election.

CLEEN stated that as it has become the pattern, in deploying troops during election, there was very heavy deployment of security personnel across the state of Osun for the election. “They mounted road blocks, conducted stop and search and patrolled various polling areas. However, their presence did not hinder the electoral process and there was no major security breach”.

The Group further added that the deployment of security officials who were deployed in significant numbers to various polling units across the state helped. It observed that a majority of polling units had three or more security officials. Though the group explained that there were isolated reports of late arrival of security officials in Unit 007, Ward 011, Ede north LGA and crowd control challenges, especially where there were just one or two security officials like in Unit 011, Ward 006 and Unit 007, Ward 011 Ede North; Unit 005, Ward 002, Ife East; and Unit 002, Ward 002, Isokan LGA.

On the conduct of security personnel during the Election, the Foundation’s reports from across the areas indicated that most security officials on election duty carried out their duties in a very professional and commendable manner.

“They were alert, impartial, approachable and coordinated.  In places were crowd management became a challenge, they were able to call for back up from the armed roving patrol teams who intervened to restore order. However, a few incidents were reported such as the harassment of observers (Unit 003, Ward 004, Ife East LGA; Unit 001, Ward 009, Irewole LGA), and a minor scuffle between the police and soldiers at a check point close to Unit 001, Ward 002 in Idi-ore, Ayedire LGA”. However, CLEEN said the presence of masked security personnel was also noted as a worrisome trend during the elections. The Foundation’s report on the welfare of security personnel, according to the Foundation was adequate. It was gathered that the provision of adequate welfare for security officials on election duty remains a pressing challenge.

“Most of the police officers especially those from the other state commands, complained of poor accommodation and feeding arrangements. For instance, some officials deployed to the state on Sunday 3, August 2014 slept in empty primary school buildings on their own mats and only received a token amount on Friday 8 August 2014. This makes them increasingly vulnerable to compromise and should be addressed urgently”.

On deployment of election logistics across the state, CLEEN observed that the election materials and personnel were reported to have arrived on time. INEC’s ad hoc personnel were alleged to have also demonstrated a better understanding of the process and were able to manage it effectively.  It was gathered that because of this, accreditation, voting and counting all went on schedule, with little or no challenges in most places.

Meanwhile, the group in its effort to continue to have violence free election in Nigeria recommends in areas of improvement. The Foundation commended the training of INEC adhoc but said more needs to be done in that regards.

“The improvements in training and effectively deployment of INEC ad hoc staff and materials are commendable but much work still needs to be done to improve the quality of the voters’ register and minimize incidents of voters’ exclusion because of missing or inaccurate data”.

According to them, there was need for security agencies to plan ahead of each election and ensure adequate logistics provision for personnel it would be deploying to cater for their welfare while on electoral duty and minimize their vulnerability to compromise.

“Security agencies should work towards better coordination and synergy amongst their personnel on election duty and identifiable tags should be given to those deployed to facilitate accountability for their conduct”, it added.

“INEC and law enforcement agencies should take steps to hold political parties and their agents accountable for their conduct during elections put an end to impunity for electoral offences by arresting and prosecuting offenders”.

In the other hand, Eastern Union, a cultural-political organisation said the just concluded Osun State governorship election has left a lot of lessons to learn for both Nigerian people and to the APC party. In its Press Release made available to Daily Newswatch, the group through its national President, Honourable Charles Anike, stated that election has reaffirmed the readiness of the INEC to conduct free and fair elections in Nigeria come 2015.

“It has also shown that elections in Nigeria can be violence fair and free, if properly policed and monitored”.

According to the group, the election was also a lesson to the APC leadership and members to try for once to have faith and believe in the processes.

EU disclosed that this was necessary in view of the fact that if the result of the election was on the side of the PDP, the party would have raised dust and protested. “The processes would have been faulted but now, there are no comments. Confirming the popular saying that when a dog bites a man, it won’t make news but when a man bites a dog; it usually makes headline”, he stated.

“This was evidenced when Governor Aregbesola like his Edo state counterpart Adams Oshiomhole was already complaining while the voting was still in progress. The party members should at this point try at-least for once learn and develop the spirit of sportsmanship and therefore stop all the unnecessary noise and unwarranted criticism, which they usually employed to hit-up to polity”.  

Anike advised that APC to learn from the Osun election outcome and show sense of political maturity and learn from the quality examples exhibited by the PDP. He said APC should always learn how to congratulate any winner irrespective of party affiliations.

“The Osun election has also shown that President Goodluck Jonathan is sincere and committed to change the cause of history in the Nigeria democracy. This is evidenced by his magnanimity always displayed by congratulating winners’ whether from his PDP party or from the opposition”, Anike quipped.