Some parties have said the today’s local government elections in Rivers State have been compromised by the Rivers State Independent Electoral Commission, RISIEC.
This is as the parties protested at RISIEC headquarters against non-payment of grant to parties two days to the election.
According to Progress Ogbokuma, the Chairman of the African Action Congress, the state government has compromised the election by not releasing grants to the participating parties to enable them prepare for the election properly.
He said: “In previous LGA polls there have been grants given to political parties to enable them carry out their activities smoothly.
“It is really discouraging that as at this time there have not been such grants disbursed and the RSIEC Chairman have come up openly to disregard such agreement between INEC and RSIEC stating such never happened.
“It clearly shows that tomorrow’s election is already biased and lack genuineness. We cannot be deceived by RSIEC.
“With or without their grant, we will come to the poll and victory is ours. Governor Wike’s threat to arrest anyone who tries to disrupt the Election is one of their strategies to hijack and arrest opposition parties at the polls come tomorrow.
“We have spoken to our candidates and supporters to be very vigilant and maintain peace. I believe in free and fair elections and who ever the people chooses will wear the crown.
“We won’t fight nobody come tomorrow and we expect they also don’t intimidate, harass and molest our candidates and supporters come tomorrow.”
But Desmond Akawor, the state chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, while reacting to the development, said there was no provision for grant for this election.
