The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) is to convene an emergency meeting with Resident Electoral Commissioners (RECs) on Wednesday, May 19 2021 to address recurrent attacks on its facilities.
The emergency meeting will among other things address the Sunday night attack on the Enugu INEC office by hoodlums during which at least eight vehicles were burnt with about six others damaged.
A further statement will be released ahead of another emergency meeting with heads of all the security agencies in the country under the auspices of the Inter-Agency Consultative Committee on Election Security (ICCES), according to a release by INEC National Commissioner and Chairman Information and Voter Education Committee, Festus Okoye.
Okoye said, “last night Sunday 16th May 2021, the Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) for Enugu State, Emeka Ononamadu, reported an attack on the State Headquarters office of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Enugu.
“Some unidentified persons overpowered the security personnel on duty around 9.00pm and tried to set the entire building ablaze. The attention of the security agencies as well as the Federal and State Fire Services in Enugu was drawn to the unfolding situation and they responded swiftly.”
Statistics of fire incidents showed that the most affected states include Akwa Ibom (four), Abia (three) Anambra (two), Imo (two) and Enugu (two).
Other states that witnessed fire incidents between February 2019 and May 2021 are Borno, Ebonyi, Jigawa, Kano, Ondo, Plateau and Rivers, Abuja was also affected.
On Sunday night, the Enugu state headquarters of the Commission was attacked by hoodlums who overpowered the security personnel on duty.
