Atiku’s Call For My Removal A Waste Of Time – Lagos INEC REC

The call for the resignation of the Independent National Electoral Commission’s (INEC) Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) in Lagos State, Olusegun Agbaje has been described as a waste of time.

Agbaje said the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar was only wasting his time by requesting his sack.

Naija News understands that the Lagos INEC REC reacted after Atiku through his Special Assistant on Public Communications, Phrank Shaibu claimed that he was planning to compromise the election by engaging the services of the Lagos State Park and Garage Management Committee led by Musiliu Akinsanya, also known as MC Oluomo, for the movement of sensitive electoral materials.

Naija News reported on 8 February that Atiku called INEC to immediately remove Agbaje because he has compromised by showing partisanship.

The former vice president said it was curious that Agbaje had insisted on using MC Oluomo, who is a member of the All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Council.

Atiku described as watery Agbaje’s excuse that INEC would not be able to use the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) and the Road Transport Employees Association of Nigeria (RTEAN) because they had been barred in Lagos State.

However, in Agbaje’s reaction to the allegation, he said INEC did not have any agreement with Oluomo, because Electoral Officers were responsible for logistics arrangements.

Agbaje told The Punch “I don’t have any agreement with Oluomo, I don’t know Oluomo and I have never met him in my life. Whoever is saying that should come out and tell us more about it. So, anybody calling for my resignation is just wasting time. Nobody can distract me from doing my job. I am responsible to the INEC chairman and members of the committee in Abuja, so all these are just distractions. We had a stakeholders meeting and we addressed it.

“On the issue of how to access vehicles, the electoral officers at the local governments are the ones to secure vehicles at their various levels. That has been my pattern since I joined the commission because I want to know who to hold responsible if they don’t commence elections by 8:30 am.

“The electoral officers are already getting the vehicles and they have almost completed the arrangement. Soon, we will be inviting the Federal Road Safety Corps to inspect the vehicles. We told all the political parties that if they have a better arrangement than what we are doing at present, they should tell us.”