Jigawa to spend N1bn on LG poll

The Jigawa State Independent Electoral Commission (JISIEC) says around N1 billion has been budgeted for the local government election scheduled for June 26.

Adamu Ibrahim, JISIEC chairman, disclosed this in a interview with NAN on Sunday.

He, however, did not give a breakdown of the electoral budget.

“The budget is almost N1 billion. We are the state with the lowest budget because we planned to minimise our spending due to the situation that we are in. What we have is very adequate for us to conduct the elections,” he said.

“We have our own election budget. So, whatever we are going to execute at a time, we just have the funds to do the job.

“Actually, we don’t have any problem with the funding. We are well funded and we are ready for the election, God-willing.”

Ibrahim added that the state may not be able to use card readers during the election, as there isn’t time to train the electoral officials on usage of smart card readers.

“Honestly, we are not prepared to use the card reader now. It is an electronic system and the person who is supposed to use it has to be trained and time is against us,” Ibrahim said.

The JISIEC chairman said the commission’s priority is to organise free and fair elections without disenfranchising any eligible voter, irrespective of whether card readers are used or not during the elections.

He assured residents that the election will be conducted in all the 27 LGAs, adding that all political parties will be given equal treatment throughout the voting process.

“We have 287 wards in the 27 local government areas of Jigawa state and we have 3,527 polling units,” Ibrahim said.

He explained that the commission also had 11,357 ad hoc staff that will be involved in the election, and announced that the sale of nomination forms for the office of the chairmen and councillors will commence on May 24.