- NSCDC denies sending personnel to NUJ election venue
Oyo state correspondent for DAILY POST newspaper, Mr. Musliudeen Adebayo has kicked against what he described as illegal disqualification of his candidature in the election of Correspondent’s chapel in the state.
Our correspondent gathered that Mr. Adebayo had earlier urged the state council of Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) to disband the electoral committee over lack of confidence in the committee.
Adebayo urged the NUJ to stop the election over irregularities.
Adebayo’s petition to NUJ reads, “I Musliudeen Adebayo, Oyo State correspondent for DAILY POST shown interest to contest the position of Assistant Secretary of the chapel. I attended the chapel membership screening and the election screening committees. But, to my surprise, the Credential Committee decided to disqualify me claiming that I failed to present letter of appointment.
“Let me inform you that my employment letter was presented and the chairman of the committee, Sola Adeyemo called my editor who confirmed that he was the one who issued the letter in 2017.
“The NUJ should as a matter of fact disband the Credential Committee for lack of credibility. NUJ should wade in and ensure that only practicing and qualified people are allowed to vote and be voted for”.
Our correspondent, however, reports that the embattled electoral committee went ahead to conduct the election on Tuesday despite several petitions written by Adebayo and other members of the union who were disenfranchised.
It was gathered that the committee conducted the election with the aid of some operatives of Nigeria Security and Civil Defense Corps (NSCDC) who went to the venue to intimidate members.
It was gathered that the two NSCDC officials led by one Mr. Ojo acted without the consent of the state command.
The two officials, who drove a Toyota Camry car with registration number NRK 297 PM were used to harass and intimidate some members of the union who protested against the election.
Some other members of the union who were qualified to vote were also disenfranchised. They included Seye Olumide of Guardian, Kazeem Awojoodu of Daily Independent, Dapo Salami of Vision Update and John Teidi of OGBC.
Salami who spoke on behalf of the disenfranchised members stated that the list of eligible voters was released by the NUJ and Credential Committee barely 12 hours to the election, which his name and others were missing.
He added that some people were fraudulently included in the voters list.
Salami said, “Some people who are not eligible to vote because they do not have medium but impersonating some medium were included in the voting list. All the petitions forwarded to NUJ on the impersonation of some members were left unattended to by the leadership of NUJ.
“In the voting list released by both NUJ and credential committee, one Ola Ajayi who was no more working with Vanguard is using the name of the organisation to vote in the election.
“Aside Ola Ajayi, there are others who have no medium at all but despite petitions written against their eligibility, the Oyo NUJ went ahead to include them in the voting list while authentic correspondent of the Guardian Newspapers, Seye Olumide, Daily Independent reporter, Kazeem Awojodu, Vision Update Correspondent, Dapo Salami and OGBC Correspondent John Teidi, were not included in the voting list.
“All these complain were reported to the leadership of Oyo NUJ, which supposed to clear members but the Council jettisoned the petitions unattended to.
“It was in this line with this that we are using this medium to call the attention of National body of the NUJ to the atrocities of Oyo NUJ”.
NSCDC denies sending personnel to NUJ election venue
The Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, NSCDC, Oyo state, has denied sending any of its personnel to the presence of the NUJ election to monitor the exercise.
NSCDC Public Relations Officer, Oluwole Olusegun, in a statement issued on Tuesday in Ibadan, the state capital, shortly after the exercise, said, “the Oyo state correspondence Chapel did not inform me of their election and as such Oyo state command is not aware of any unknown personnel that was alleged to have come to supervise such election.”
Olusegun said, “It is worthy to note that our officers wear rank, name tag, ID card and badges for proper identification. So, officers don’t bear Mr Ojo. The Intelligence and Investigative Department of the Command will be informed to commence investigation to unravel such act.
Olusegun described the Command as a friend of the NUJ, Oyo state Council, the correspondence Chapel and other chapels in the state.
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