The Independent National Election Commission’s (INEC) Lagos State Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), Olusegun Agbaje, has rescheduled voting at the eight polling units at Victoria Garden City (VGC) on Lagos Island for today.
The upmarket estate’s 6,024 electorates challenged INEC’s decision to relocate their voting stations from VGC Park to outside the estate’s gate.
Hundreds of prospective voters were observed protesting INEC’s decision to transfer voting centers outside the estate, which they claimed could be easily accessed by hoodlums.
They called INEC’s decision unconstitutional because the re-designated centers were not displayed on the INEC website.
Mr. Olumide Akpata, a local and former President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), said citizens refused to vote at the new polling stations because it is illegal and residents will not submit to a method that does not make their votes count.
Nevertheless, Agbaje, who arrived at the estate at 1 p.m., stated that the commission chose to relocate the polling centers outside the estate due to an unpalatable experience their ad hoc had during the February 25 Presidential and National Assembly elections in the estate.
He especially accused the estate’s occupants of “keeping INEC staff prisoner during the last election and not releasing them until the next morning.”
He stated that he could no longer subject innocent NYSC members and other workers to such agony, which is why INEC wrote to the estate’s management last week to inform them that their polling stations had been relocated outside the gate.
Nevertheless, Akpata claimed that Agbaje was provided incorrect information regarding what happened on February 25, prompting the voting process to be terminated at 3:20 a.m.
He said that INEC staff arrived late and tried to leave early. He said that at the end of the exercise, it was determined that the number of accredited voters displayed by the BVAS did not coincide with the number of votes cast, which may invalidate the entire voting at that center.
The locals insisted that the Polling Officer correct the error, which he did, but they were startled that the erroneous results were displayed on the INEC portal.
Agbaje initially agreed to hold the election between 2 and 7 p.m., but the executive officials of the residents association insisted that everyone in line be allowed to complete their civic obligations, forcing the election to be postponed until today.
