TELL Magazine

 The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC has within the last three weeks, lost three of its offices to fire incidents.

With less than one week to the presidential election, the office of the electoral body in Awka, Anambra State was on Tuesday, gutted by fire. This brings to three, the number of INEC offices that have been raised by fire in a space of two weeks.

The Anambra fire incident, which eye witnesses said began at about 2:30pm on Tuesday, destroyed sensitive electoral materials including ballot papers, card readers and permanent voters cards, PVCs. The cause of the incident is yet to be determined.

On February 2, INEC’s office in Isiala Ngwa Local Government Area of Abia State was also gutted by fire. Although the cause of the fire is yet to be determined, Police Public Relations Officer, PPRO in the state was quoted as having said the police suspects that hoodlums might have poured fuel through the window of the office where the PVCs were kept and set them on fire.

Similarly, INEC’s office in Qua’an Pan Local Government Area of Plateau State on Saturday, February 9 went up in flames. The fire incident was said to have been caused by ‘a drunken security man.’ Various election materials like ballot boxes, voters register, uncollected PVCs card readers and other materials were consumes in the inferno.