Nigeria’s Electoral body, INEC, has promised to ensure a level playing field for all political parties ahead of the July 16 governorship election in Osun State.
With barely three days to the close of the campaign by political parties, the commission’s chairman, Mahmood Yakubu, on Tuesday, said the choice of who leads the state now rests on the electorates.
Mr Yakubu spoke at a stakeholders’ meeting in Osogbo, the Osun State capital on Tuesday.
“For us in INEC, let me reassure political parties, candidates, and the electorate that the choice of who becomes the next governor of Osun State is entirely in the hands of voters.
“As I have repeatedly said in previous engagements with stakeholders, INEC will not take any action to the advantage or disadvantage of any political party or candidate. Our focus is on the processes and procedures as provided by law,” Mr Yakubu reassured parties and candidates.
In a purely male-dominated contest, 14 governorship candidates have been produced by 14 parties to challenge the incumbent, Gboyega Oyetola of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Saturday’s election.
Prominent among the candidates challenging Mr Oyetola are Ademola Adeleke of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Yusuf Lasun of the Labour Party (LP), Oyegoke Omigbodun of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), and Akin Ogunbiyi of the Accord Party (AP).
Mr Yakubu said 1,479,595 persons out of the 1,955,657 registered voters in the state have picked up their PVCs ahead of the poll.
He appealed to all registered voters that are yet to collect their PVCs to seize the opportunity of the additional measures to do so.
“We are also updating our records to provide a detailed breakdown of PVCs collected by polling units. This will be concluded and made available on Friday 15th July 2022,” Mr Yakubu said.