Stakeholders in Borno, Adamawa and Yobe, have expressed satisfaction with the level of preparations for the 2023 general election.
A cross section of those who spoke on Sunday, said they were optimistic of hitch-free general election.
Mohammed Magaji, Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Borno Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), said that the far reaching security strategies had been put in place to ensure peaceful conduct of the election.
“Vigorous publicity is ongoing and will continue to the election period for voters to know where they have been migrated to, taking into consideration proximity of the voters to their respective polling units.
“These also include advocacy visits embarked upon by my humble self and management to educate voters on the introduction of technology in our electoral process,” he said.
Mr Abdu Umar, the state Commissioner of Police, said that the police would deployed over 10,000 police personnel across the 27 Local Government Areas ( LGAs) of the state to ensure hitch-free poll.
Umar said that the agencies through the Joint Operation Room(JOR), would collaborate with all the security agencies in the state to implement response management on pre-election and post election strategies.
“Even as the situation was worst in 2015 and 2019, peaceful election still held in Borno.
“Now that we are leveraging on the fact that the situation has improved; meaning that there is relative peace and civic authority has been restored in most of the areas, we are expected to have a peaceful elections,” Umar said.
On his part, the Shehu of Borno, Alhaji Abubakar Ibn-Garbai, commended the peace accord signed by political parties and urged them to support INEC and other stakeholders for a peaceful lection.
Alhaji Nuhu Ari, the INEC Adamawa, REC, said things were going on smoothly with 75 per cent of non-sensitive materials already on ground and the testing of 4,104 Bimodal Voter Authentication System (BVAS) machine ongoing.
Ari said the commission had already published the names of first batch of 10,165 ad hoc staff for training out of the 10, 932 that applied.
He also said that the commission and security agencies in the state were working in close collaboration to ensure the conduct of a hitch free poll.
SP Suleiman Nguroje, Spokesperson for Adamawa police command, said the police with other security agencies were fully prepared for the election.
“We have designed a security template that would ensure the conduct of a hitch free polls,” Nguroje said.
DSP Dingus Abdulkarim, the Spokesperson for Yobe police command, said that all polling units in the 17 LGAs of the state had been captured and adequate personnel allocated to ensure hitch free election.
Abdulkarim said logistics items had arrived at the command while others were being expected, while personnel had been trained for the all-important assignment.
The spokesperson, said the command had cautioned politicians against unguarded utterances, vote-buying and other acts that could jeopardize the election.
“ The state Police Commissioner made it clear to politicians that any act of illegality will not be tolerated, and will be prosecuted to the letter,” he said.
Mrs Rafkatu Duku, the state Head of INEC Voter Education and Publicity Unit, said the commission had been educating the electorate on the need for peaceful conduct of the election.
“God’s willing by Sunday Jan. 29, we will round up PVC collection in all the 17 LGAs of the state.
“The commissioner is working closely with all security agencies under the auspices of Inter Agency Consultative Committee on election security, set up at the national level,” she said.
Malam Bala Muhammad, the Yove Chairman, Inter-party Advisory Committee (IPAC) also expressed satisfaction with the level of preparations by INEC officials and security agencies in the state.
