INC Election Aborted As Hoodlums Storm Venue, Cart Away Ballot Boxes

The election into the Executive Committee of Ijaw National Council (INC) in Yenagoa, Bayelsa state capital was halted Saturday night as hired thugs disrupted the process.

The thugs stormed the election venue after some results other than that of Secretary, Vuce President and President have been declared and carted away the remaining ballot boxes.

The hoodlums, armed with dangerous weapons were said to have gain access into the venue after forcing security guard to beat a retreat.

Sources said that over a thousand thugs invaded the venue after cutting off the electricity supply to the hall and made away with the unannounced result in the remaining ballot boxes.

There was heavy commotion in the metropolis as several delegates and observers had to scampered for safety when the violence broke out. Some of delegates and observers fled into the creek around Ijaw House in Asikoro axis of Yenagoa, eyewitness said.

Trouble was said to have started earlier in the day at the Gabriel Okara cultural center, venue for accreditation of voters, when the exercise was delayed for several house as hired youths stormed the venue and insisted that the list of delegates for the election contains under aged delegates.

Source said that some state government officials who were rooting for the governor’s favoured candidates sensing that they were loosing out in the positions declared had fueled the upheaval.

However, Fidelis Soriwie, Media aide to the Bayelsa State Governor, Seriake Dickson, claimed that from the outcome so far, Chief Broadrick Bozimo, who was a Presidential Candidate, Chief Francis Doukpola, Vice President Central and Inatimi Spiff, ( National Secretary) were winning before the disruption.

Recall that Governor Seriake Dickson had earlier openly endorsed Broadrick Bozimi, and urged all delegates to vote for him, an action that angered most of the other aspirants.

But the claim that Bozimo was winning was debunked by the Chairman of the electoral committee, Rear Admiral Woyengidinikpete Yanga, (Retd), who said they were yet to begin the counting of votes for the position of Secretary, Vice President and Prisident.

Yanga told newsmen that the body cannot take any decision at the moment than to stop the process.

He said: “We had almost completed the election when hoodlums came in, put off the light and take away ballot boxes with votes inside, before then, we had already completed the results for some positions, it was remaining the Secretary, Vice President and the President positions,” he said.

Reaching to the development, one of the presidential candidate, Professor Benjamin Okaba, said INC aborted election clearly show that the agitation for state Police is a bad idea.

Okaba, who spoke after he escaped from the mayhem, said that the manner the hoodlums held delegates hostage at the Dr. Gabriel Okara Cultural Center in the presence of security agents for three hours proved how desperate state governors can be when they are bent on having total control of both public and private institutions.

Okaba, who is the Dean, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at the Federal University in Otuoke, said the thugs that were allegedly sponsored by some highly placed persons in the Bayelsa State Government .

He lamented that it was shame to witnessed such an incident which has turned the Ijaw Nation that used to be the epicenter of the struggle for emancipation into a laughing stuck.

The Police spokesman in the state, SP Asinim Butswat could not be reached as a time of filling this time.

INC is the highest socio-cultural organization in Ijaw nation and over 400 delegates cutting across Bayelsa, Delta, Edo, Rivers, Akwa Ibom and other states where Ijaws resides, we’re to vote in the botched election.