Three months after the demise of Hon. Mustapha Abdullahi representing Sabwa Constituency of Katsina State who lost his life to road accident on July 5, 2019, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has fixed Saturday October 26 for the conduct of the bye-election.
In a statement released by the commission, the Resident Electoral Commissioner for Katsina State, Alhaji Jibrin Zarewa disclosed that the decision to conduct the bye election on this date as agreed by the stakeholders at the meeting, was as a result of the declaration of the vacancy by the State House of Assembly through a letter addressed to the commission dated September 26.
Zarewa said: ’’The purpose of this meeting is to inform you of the vacancy and position of the law with regards to elections and filling vacancies thereto. Even though a lot of activities are involved spanning from those of INEC, the political parties, Security agencies, and other relevant agencies, we are bound to respect the position of the law’’
The Katsina REC revealed that the constituency has 10 registration areas, 74 polling units and 61 voting points, making up a total of 125 voting centers with a voting population of 63,435 registered voters.
“The commission will source the 512 required numbers of electoral personnel from the NYSC and Tertiary institutions from the state.
He pledged that the distribution of sensitive materials through to the conduct of the election proper shall remain open and transparent to the satisfaction of all stakeholders.
Meanwhile, the INEC boss has stated firmly that only 8 Political Parties are existent with functional offices in the state, adding that the remaining numbers only exist on paper.
He said: ’’We may stop corresponding with parties that has no clearly identifiable and functional offices. When we write, we only communicate with 7 or 8 parties that we know are functional and the rest of the letters we dump them at IPAC.