ONITSHA—EIGHT workers of the Anambra State Independent Electoral Commission (ANSIEC) have been sacked for gross indiscipline. The Chairman of the commission, Chief Cornel Umeh dropped the hint yesterday while addressing newsmen on the activities of ANSIEC towards the conduct of local government election in the state. Umeh said that the eight disengaged staff included five acting electoral officers, two assistant electoral officers and one principal executive officer. He said the action was to make sure that sanity reigned in the commission to enable it conduct a free, fair and credible election. The idea is to ensure that whoever will work here must be mentally and physically alert.”
He said he had on assumption of office carried out an in-house screening of the staff based on certain criteria.According to Umeh, the affected staff were deseconded to their parent ministries from where they were drawn to work in the commission. As part of the commission’s effort to conduct a peaceful, orderly, free and fair election, the ANSIEC boss further hinted that a 5-day workshop for commissioners, electoral officers, assistant electoral officers would be organised next week by the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) based in the United Kingdom (UK).
The essence of the workshop, he said, was to ensure that the entire staff of ANSIEC were well equiped for an efficient conduct of the forthcoming council polls in the area. Umeh said that ANSIEC would ensure prompt arrival of electoral materials to various polling booths and centres as well as making sure that elections started and ended at the stipulated time through out the state to avoid any form of fracas or electoral fraud.“We must ensure that the names of voters tally with the ones in the voters’ register. Efforts must be made to ensure that voters cards are ticked accordingly after voting to guard against multiple voting.”On the issue of logistics, Umeh said that programmes that would ensure the success of the council polls had been well articulated to the state government for prompt action.
“I assure you that at the end of the forthcoming local government election, you will see something different. It will not only be free and fair but credible,” he declared.
