The Saturday 9th March Governorship and state House of Assembly elections in Borno state was chahracterised with low turnout at the polling units against the expectations of political candidates.
In Maiduguri, the Borno state capital, the situation is worse as in some polling units, there were absence of voters at polling units.
Our correspondent who went round some polling Units in Maiduguri metropolitan council, Jere, Mafa and Konduga local government areas of Borno state observed that in most polling units, electoral official were idle waiting for eligible voters.
Meanwhile, the election was generally peaceful and smooth but political observers were of the opinion that the outcome of the election will be very poor.
Mohammed Ahmed, the Presiding officers at Gomari Bus Stop I, II and III as well as Lawan Jiddah I and II said all the electoral materials, security agents and party agents are available but lamented the low turnout of electorates on queue to vote.
“The enthusiasm is not there again, people feel reluctant to come out and vote. We have no problem logistics wise. All the Smart Card Readers and ballot papers are intact and functioning well”, Ahmed said.
Similarly, an electorate at Gomari III Polling Unit, Adam Masa, a tailor and resident of Gomari said:” We learn that the election is predominated with low turnout. To me it is due to the fact that last election results were alleged to have been rigged or manipulated although there were no cases of snatching of ballot boxes in this state.
“While some of the residents complaint that the money given to ward and district heads for the electorates to cast their votes in favour of their party candidates was not shared or distributed to them, especially, the women who came out en masse to vote in the last presidential election.
“Whoever emerges as governor is not our problem because the state government is not helping matters neither are doing anything good for the poor masses, unemployed youths and the poor women who are mostly widows and orphans from the Boko Haram insurgency.”
