Oyo state Chairman of the Inter Party Advisory Council (IPAC) Alhaji Waheed Oyewole, yesterday said the state Independent Electoral Commission (OYSIEC) may not conduct free, fair and credible local government election in the state on February 11 2017 as expected.
Oyewole stated this while addressing a press conference in Ibadan on the forthcoming local government elections across the 33 councils and the 37 LCDAs in Oyo state.
The IPAC chairman declared that for now, it is glaring that OYSIEC is not sincere with its promise to conduct free, fair and credible local government election in Oyo state going by the level of preparedness on ground by the commission.
“OYSIEC is not sincere about the conduct of local government election in the state. We can’t wait indefinitely. We are ready for February election if OYSIEC is ready.
“We will not allow them to rest because we are ready to sit down with them and sort out any challenges likely militating against the conduct of the election. I don’t think anything should be done in secrecy. IPAC is an advisory body, and we’re ever ready to function in that regard effectively” he said.
Oyewole maintained that OYSIEC had failed to reply several letters written by IPAC which clearly showed its alleged insincerity to conduct a free, fair and credible election, adding that “as we speak, IPAC has written several letters to the chairman of OYSIEC as regards the forthcoming council polls but there was never a reply from the commission”.
He lamented that “apart from the time-table that was released, OYSIEC has failed to give out appropriate forms to all political parties for effective participation. We suspect the inevitable as regards OYSIEC failure to put up all machineries that should be in place”.
“The announcement by OYSIEC to conduct an election in February 11, 2017 has not been met with the right attitude towards the actualisation of the said election. The unpreparedness of OYSIEC has exposed their insincerity to conduct a free, fair and credible election if at all it did happen”.