We have had 419 cases in court – INEC

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has said that it had been involved in 419 court cases over election matters from 2016 to date.

Chairman of the commission, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, said this on Tuesday at an interactive session with a group of civil society organizations, under the umbrella of the Situation Room in Abuja

He said: “Between 2016 and 2017, till this week, we have appeared for 419 cases in four different courts; so, I will say that in the last two years INEC has been dragged to court 419 times.

“Conversely, 187 of them are at Federal and state high courts while 141 are at the Court of Appeal. Sixty-one of them are at the Supreme Court and two at the Industrial Court.”

On the forthcoming Anambra election, Yakubu said that the political atmosphere in the state was quite peaceful as compared to recent elections, adding that “up till today, we have no case in court on the nomination of any candidate’’.

He said that though the situation was unusual, it was rarely amazing in the context of litigation since the 2015 general elections.

The chairman said that 37 political parties were participating in the Nov. 18 Anambra governorship election which was a record for any governorship election in the country.

He said that INEC monitored all the political party’s primaries and that 35 of them complied with the rules except for two that changed their candidates after the primaries, which was not allowed.

He said that Anmabra had 21 local government areas, with 326 wards, 468 polling units, 724 voting points and 2,154,738 registered voters, including 203,681 new registrants.

#Court #INEC