The Inspector-General of Police in Nigeria, IGP Usman Baba Alkali has assured the residents of South-East that an election will be held in the zone come 2023.
Alkali, represented by the Assistant Inspector-General of Police in charge of zone 9, Isaac Akinmoyede, gave the assurance during the opening ceremony of the “South-East 2023 Elections Security Management Workshop” held on Saturday in Enugu.
He said that the police was building a robust synergy with other security organisations and formations to ensure that the 2023 election remained seamless and “very peaceful”.
According to him, “we are brainstorming together to fashion out ways to deal with existing and emerging security threats headlong within the South-East”.
“It is clear that with robust synergy, cooperation and joint operations in this area will be the most peaceful and our people will surely come out to exercise their civic responsibility.
“We are working relentlessly on the goal of ensuring that election holds in the South-East and people’s vote is secured and it will count,” the IG assured.
Earlier, Solomon Arase, a retired Inspector General of Police, said that the workshop was meant for all security agencies and formations in the South-East to get them ready for the task of a peaceful, credible and hitch-free election in 2023.
Arase, who is a consultant in the workshop, said that the workshop would help to identify previous security gaps in election security as well as pinpoint the tasks and responsibilities of each security agency concerned about the election.
“Security agencies have gathered here on how to study trends and patterns of crimes before and during elections and how effective to deal with it holistically and collaboratively,” he said.
The Commissioner of Police in Enugu State, Mr Abubakar Lawal, urged the people of the zone and the state not to express any fear about the 2023 election.
“2023 Election will hold and we are doing everything humanly possible to ensure that. Our people should not entertain any fear or any opinion on the contrary,” Lawal assured.
The workshop was attended by many security agencies, including but not limited to the Nigerian Army, Air Force, Navy, Department of State Service DSS, and the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps.
Others are the Nigeria Correctional Service, Nigeria Immigration Service, Nigeria Customs Service, Federal and State Fire Services as well as National Drug Law Enforcement Agency among others.
The workshop was initiated and organised by the Inspection General of Police to further build the capacity of security agencies and their personnel concerned with election security.
Dominica Nwabufo
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