CDHR Mobilises 4500 Poll Observers

As the Nigeria’s general election approaches, the Committee for the Defence of Human Rights, CDHR, say it has mobilised 4,500 observers to monitor the elections across the country to ensure that the polls are free and fair.

Already, the election observers have been trained and ready to monitor the polls which many Nigerians and international observers are keenly interested in.

CDHR President, Barrister Olasupo Ojo said at the passing out ceremony of trainees at the organisation’s headquarters at Adeniyi Jones, Ikeja, Lagos, South West Nigeria that the group was now ready to monitor the April polls.

“The trained observers are to monitor all the April general elections and 750 are to operate in each of the six zones we have in Nigeria. That is, 750 for South-West, same for South-East, South-South, North-West, North-East and North-Central, totaling 4, 500 people.

“We are tired of monitoring of fraudulent elections in Nigeria where every party rigged elections to impose their candidates. This is why we trained this men and women of credibility to monitor the forthcoming elections and defend people’s mandate everywhere in the country,” he stated.

He added that the trained observers would be equipped with cameras to record events during the elections and transfer it to a website designed for the election (electionwatch2011.org) where it would be sent to internet for the whole world to see.

“What we are doing is part of our contribution to the process of democracy in Nigeria,” he said.

The CDHR boss declared that the past 12 years of the nation’s democracy was a waste because of  bad governance, quoting former Ekiti governor, Ayo Fayose who said to him at a meeting that “I got to the position of governor anyhow and not by the mandate of the people and nobody can take it from me.”

According to Ojo, “we are tired of observing fraudulent elections and we are determined to fight and defend the people’s mandate like we did for June 12, 1993 presidential election.

“We fought the military to standstill to gain this democracy but it is disheartening to see those who call themselves democrats and progressive people voted for in the past elections to forget the Nigerians who put them there and embarked on looting of treasury,” he lamented.

“Such will no longer be allowed and we will vote, monitor and defend the people’s mandate with everything we have to make sure that the people we trust and voted for are there and not riggers who want to force themselves in to loot the treasury,” he added.

He, however, urged the observers and Nigerians in general to sacrifice their time by coming out to vote, stay near the polling booths and defend their votes in order not to allow the politicians who were determined to rig to have field day.

—Kazeem Ugobdaga