Suspected political thugs have reportedly attacked officials of the Oyo State Independence Electoral Commission (OYSIEC) on Friday (today) while they were transporting election materials for the upcoming Saturday election.
ADULAWO News gathered that the incident occurred in Okeho, within the Kajola Local Government area of the state.
The local government election is scheduled to take place on Saturday in all 33 local government councils across the state. However, there have been conflicting reports regarding the transportation of election materials to their designated centres.
According to one source from the agrarian community, the people allegedly seized the materials. On the other hand, Barrister Isiaka Olagunju, the State Chairman of OYSIEC, who confirmed the attack, stated that no materials were snatched.
Furthermore, the source informed Vanguard that a bag containing some money was supposedly discovered in the possession of the officials, which raised suspicion among the people.
“That is not true. The fact is that there was an attack on our officials last night.”
“Our officials were attacked at our office in Okeho. No ballot paper was snatched. The DPO of Okeho and other security agencies followed our Electoral Officials to come back to Ibadan. They just went back to Okeho now. And we have directed the Divisional Police Officer of Okeho to arrest the suspects. That is what happened,” Barrister Olagunju said while dismissing the allegations.
However, as of the time this report was filed, the State Police Command had yet to issue an official statement regarding the incident.