Paul Arkwright
The British High Commissioner to Nigeria Paul Arkwright has rued vote-buying in the recently-held Ekiti governorship election.
Arkwright noted this on Friday in Abuja after a meeting with the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission Mahmood Yakubu.
As stated by him, “I was there in Ekiti to monitor elections and I heard a lot of reports of alleged vote buying and we are convinced that some vote-buying went on.
“I condemn it. Vote buying is illegal; it is against the law, it is just as vote rigging, it is just as bad as ballot stuffing.
“We cannot make a distinction when all these activities are illegal so I condemn that. What are we going to do about it? Well, we just had a meeting with the chairman of INEC, we have been talking about public awareness and how the political parties themselves can take responsibility for condemning this action and not continuing it.
“We do hope that 2019 will be free, fair, credible and of course, peaceful elections.”
He added, “I think the election process itself went well, the materials were there, the security forces kept their distance and did manage to keep a peaceful election and we are seeing progress in how INEC is carrying out each election. So, we have confidence in INEC and the chairman.
“The UK has been a very strong supporter of INEC and together with the USAID, we are spending about $60m over a six-year period in support of deepening democracy in Nigeria.”