Security agencies are mounting close watch on the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Prof Attahiru Jega, and other national officers of the commission ahead of Saturday’s National Assembly election.
The need for the action, it was leant, was to get to the roots of the alleged sabotage of the last Saturday’s election by some workers in the commission.
Though Jega was said to have rubbished the insinuations that some workers of the commission actually worked against the conduct of the election, our correspondent gathered that security agencies, who met with President Goodluck Jonathan last week, insisted that there was a need to put the officers of the commission under surveillance.
Though Jega was said to have been under “partial surveillance” since his appointment as the chairman of the commission, security chiefs were said to have decided that there was the need to “double the surveillance around him.”
Meanwhile, the commission has ordered the investigation of a member of the Election Management Board, who was accused of being behind the inability of the commission to hold the National Assembly election last Saturday.
The management of the commission, at its meeting on Wednesday, was also said to have raised the matter with the concerned officer, who, it was further leant, strongly denied the allegation.
The officer was said to have been shown a text message sent to some of the national commissioners and other officers of the commission, alleging that the officer was behind the botched election.
A source at the meeting said, “But he denied the allegation, which he described as baseless and blackmail. He also said he knew the person behind the blackmail. He said the person had tried in vain to extort money from him in the past.”
The suspicion against the commissioner stemmed from a text message, being circulated in Abuja, detailing his alleged “unwholesome activities” which portrayed him as a mole.
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