PUSH NEWS 24 INTERNATIONAL: February 24, 2023
BREAKING – 2023 : INEC POSTPONES ELECTION
Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has suspended the election in Enugu East Senatorial District.
Push News 24 International understands that INEC Chairman, Mahmood Yakubu made this known at a media briefing on Friday in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory.
According to him, the election in the senatorial district earlier slated for Saturday, February 25, 2023, has been moved to March 11, 2023.
Yakubu said the postponement in the district which covers four local government areas became necessary with the murder of the Labour Party (LP)’s senatorial candidate for the district, Oyibo Chukwu.
He said the Labour Party reached out to the electoral body to convey its intention to provide a replacement and go ahead with the poll at the new date.
Chukwu and his personal assistant were assassinated on Wednesday when hoodlums attacked them and set their vehicle ablaze in the Eke-Otu Amechi-Awkunanaw area of Enugu.
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Recall that Push News 24 International reported that a Nigerian senatorial candidate from one opposition party and the driver of a campaign minibus belonging to another were killed in a series of coordinated attacks in southeastern Enugu State ahead of an election on Saturday, police said on Thursday.
Nigerians are due to elect their next president and lawmakers on Saturday against a chaotic backdrop of armed conflict in the northeast, high levels of crime and shortages of cash, fuel and electricity.
Enugu State police said suspected members of two Biafran separatist groups that have been banned by Nigerian authorities targeted vehicles from three political parties in simultaneous incidents at separate locations late on Wednesday.
They confirmed the death of Labour Party senatorial candidate Oyibo Chukwu, earlier reported by his party, and said the driver of a People’s Democratic Party (PDP) campaign minibus had also been killed in a separate attack.
In both cases, the attackers set vehicles ablaze with petrol bombs, burning to death their occupants, police said. Chukwu’s driver was also killed.
Police said a similar attempted attack on the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) party’s gubernatorial candidate in Enugu had been repelled.
The Enugu State police commissioner, Ahmed Ammani, in a statement urged citizens “not to succumb to the cowardly antics of the hoodlums, which is aimed at creating fear and to disrupt the electoral process”.
