The Independent National Electoral Commission’s (INEC) office in the Izzi Local Government Area of Ebonyi State was on Sunday set ablaze by suspected hoodlums.
This was disclosed in a statement signed by the National Commissioner and Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee, Festus Okoye, on Sunday.
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This is the third attack on INEC local government offices within the space of three weeks, following attacks in Ogun and Osun states.
The incident, which occurred around 10am, left the main building and all the movable and immovable items inside it burnt.
According to the statement, the burnt items included 340 ballot boxes, 130 voting cubicles, 14 electric power generators, large water storage tanks, assorted office furniture and fixtures and yet-to-be-determined quantities of Permanent Voter Cards.
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However, the commission said the police had commenced full investigation into the incident.
The statement read in part:
Sadly, this is the third attack on our local government office in less than three weeks following similar attacks on our offices in Ogun and Osun states on 10th November 2022.
Election offices have been attacked recently in the country’s southeast, where separatists are seeking a breakaway state for the local Igbo people, but attacks in the southwest are rarer.
Security will be a major issue in the election with the armed forces battling an insurgency in the northeast, heavily armed criminal gangs in the northwest and central states, and separatist agitators in the southeast.
Africa’s largest economy, Nigeria has also been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, fallout from the war in Ukraine, and its worst flooding in a decade that has impacted farms and food production.
