By Michael Nnebife
The Nigeria Union of Local Government Employees, NULGE, Anambra State Chapter, has advised the Anambra State Independent Electoral Commission, ANSIEC, to be unbiased to political parties, in the forthcoming September 28 Local Government Polls in the state, for free, fair and transparent elections.
The Anambra State President of the Union, Comrade Nicholas Aromeh, who gave the advice in a press interview in his office recently, also appealed to political parties in the state to organize themselves and get ready for the elections.
Comrade Aromeh frowned at any action that could stop the elections, urging political parties and politicians, to desist from going to court against the date for the elections, noting that such would not be for the good interest of the local government system, which, he said, had suffered a lot for long because of absence of democratic elections in the system.
He however, praised the State Governor, Prof Chukwuma Soludo, who he said, had met the time frame given by the Supreme Court to have the local governments in the country, independently managed by democratically elected officials.
Prof Soludo, Aromeh said, was doing well as he was making sure that the local government elections would be conducted so that the local governments in Anambra State would not be denied of their statutory allocation from the Federal Government.
‘When the Supreme Court gave judgement, it was stated clearly that after 90 days, any state that failed to conduct local government elections would be denied allocation from the Federal Government,’ the NULGE boss stated.
This, he said, politicians and political parties should be seriously considering.
While describing as unnecessary, the claims making the rounds that the time frame for elections was short, Aromeh argued that political parties should have known that from the day the Supreme Court gave a judgement as regards the local government financial autonomy and the elections, within 90 days, the elections would come.
Therefore, he said, political parties ought to have been ready even before now.
‘So my advice is, let them not instigate crisis or go to court. They already have structures; they should organize themselves, prepare for this elections, and go to the field.
‘Once they feature a popular candidate, there is every tendency that they will emerge victorious.
‘To ANSIEC, I say, to whom much is given, much is expected. So, to me, a very big job has been given to them.
‘They should not be biased or attach themselves to any political party. They are independent; so they should try as much as they can to conduct free, fair and transparent elections.
‘Anambra People should be ready to come out en masse to vote for candidates of their choice. We have been praying for these elections to start happening, because, for years, local government elections had not been conducted.
‘As a result of this, we have a serious setback at the local government areas,’ the NULGE boss said.
According to him, ‘If the local government elections are conducted, there will be massive transformation across the 21 Local Government Areas in the state.’
Note: Aromeh is a factional leader of NULGE in Anambra State, as another group claims authenticity following an unvacated court order that recognized its leadership.
