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Rivers, A’Ibom polls: EU rants, INEC adamant

Published

9 years ago

April 14, 2015

Haven given the nation a pass mark in the conduct of the presidential and National Assembly election, the European Union Election Observer Mission (EU EOM) on Monday lamented that the governorship election did not live up to expectation.

The body in its preliminary report released in Abuja by the European Union Election Observation Chief Observer, Santiago Fisas, identified Rivers and Akwa Ibom states as areas where violence and deliberate interference with the electoral processes were most pronounced during the exercise.

The mission noted with concern that there was an increase in security threats during the last election than the previous presidential election, resulting in the killing of no fewer than 30 persons.

The mission said that although it did not find evidence of centralised systematic manipulation, the results from Rivers State included what it called ‘highly implausible data’ while other election monitors had doubts about the data posted from other states in the South South. They did not, however, name the other states.

The mission said that collation was the weakest part of the election day process, particularly at the ward level.

The EU accused the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and the All Progressives Congress, APC, of misuse of incumbency power in the just concluded governorship and State House of Assembly (SHoA) elections across the country.

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