12th April, 2017
The Benue State Electoral Commission (BSIEC) says it will conduct credible and acceptable local government polls in spite of the very little resources given to it.
“The limited resources at our disposal will not stop us from conducting credible and transparent local government elections. All we crave for is full support from all,” its Chairman, Dr. John Tsua, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), in Makurdi on Tuesday.
The Commission has fixed June 3 for the polls.
Tsua said that the commission would not compromise integrity, but regretted that its approved budget of N1.9 billion for the exercise was slashed to N1.2 billion by the state executive council.
“In fact, out of the N1.2 billion, only N350 million has so far been released for the elections,” he said.
The BSIEC chief explained that the shortfall in funds was a major setback for the commission but expressed optimism that it would not affect the integrity of the polls.
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He said that the commission planned to invest more funds on sensitive materials and operational vehicles to ensure success and high standard of the polls.
“We are still expecting additional funds from the government but at the moment, we are working with what we have by spreading it across the needs of the commission,” he said.
Tsua said the commission would recruit 11,000 ad hoc staff, stressing that only credible applicants would be engaged.
He said that the commission would adopt online recruitment of applicants and insist on known guarantors to minimize incidences of electoral malpractices by such staff.
“The essence of the guarantors is for us to track the staff and apprehend them when they commit malpractices and try to escape.”