The Rivers State Resident Electoral Commissioner, Mr Obo Effanga, has said that the Independent National Electoral Commission will continue to abide by court orders directed at it. He was responding to an order by a Federal High Court that INEC should remove the names of the All Progressives Congress candidates in the state from its (INEC) list ahead of the 2019 election.
Speaking with PUNCH on Saturday, the Rivers State REC maintained that INEC would not hesitate to do anything it was authorised to do by the court.
Explaining that INEC had yet to publish any list of candidates, he pointed out that while the list of presidential and National Assembly candidates would be published on January 17, 2019, that of governorship and state House of Assembly candidates would be on January 31. He said, “INEC is a creation of the law. We will abide by every court decision directed at us. We have seen this happen before.
Recall that there was a tussle in one of the political parties before the Ondo State governorship election as to who the standard bearer should be. “The matter moved from one leg of court to another and it was about three days to the election that the Supreme Court gave a final judgement and INEC was bound by that. I don’t think that the people have cause to entertain any fear as INEC will do what it is authorised by law to do.
“You know that as it stands, INEC has not yet published the list of candidates for the general elections. Looking at the timetable for the elections, INEC is going to publish the list of candidates for the presidential and National Assembly elections on January 17.”
PUNCH
