By Ebriku John Friday
The election of the NNPC Abuja cooperative society held yesterday, 30th June, 2020 has been declared inconclusive.
The cooperative office, Abuja that conducted the election declared it inconclusive following the disenfranchisement of about 4000 out of 6000 members of the society.
The society had decided that online voting should be adopted in view of the Covid-19 pandemic using codes provided by the Nigerian communications satellite (NIG-COMSAT).
However, the inability of about 4000 members to access the codes generated arguments between the two contesting teams- The Consolidation and The Transformers.
Speaking on the outcome of the election, the Director General of the Consolidation Team, Engr. Mrs. Egan Ben Koko said that she was skeptical of the arrangement but all effort to get the electoral committee to test run the voting system two days before the election in a way that nobody would be disenfranchised was rebuffed by the electoral committee.
She said there were not supposed to generate codes in advance but that the codes were supposed to be generated at the point of voting. Engr. Egan added that not only could she not vote, but that three of the contestants; Waribo Cookey, Secretary; Ujah Samuel, Financial Secretary and Omoke Emmanuel- assistant secretary could not access the codes and therefore did not vote.
Also speaking, the presidential contender of the Consolidation Team, Terhemba King- Anyam said that disenfranchising over 4000 financial members of the cooperative is undemocratic and therefore unacceptable.
According to him the cooperative as an organ of the NNPC must conduct its activities in line with the core values of transparency and fairness which the parent body – NNPC upholds.
He therefore called for outright cancellation of the election and a new date fixed for the election.
Meanwhile, the presidential contender of the Transformers Team, Osandu Ibeji who was visibly disturbed by the decision of umpire asked that he be declared winner, while those who are not comfortable with it should go to court.
