INEC Redeploys Cross River Resident Electoral Commissioner, Mike Igini

by crossriverwatch admin

The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC has redeployed Mr. Mike Igini, the Resident Electoral Commissioner of Cross River State to Edo State.

Mr. Sylvester Ezeani, who is currently the REC in neighbouring Ebonyi State is to take over from Barrister Igini after a brief handig over ceremony next week.

Igini’s redeployment is part of a larger shake up within INEC which has also seen RECs in several other states being posted to other places.

CrossRiverWatch findings reveal that the redeployments are not unconnected with the contentious congresses and primaries of the ruling PDP across the states.

Politicians who won and lost elections at the party congresses and primaries are said to be pulling the strings to decide who runs the show for INEC in their respective states bearing in mind the high profile decampings that have followed.

In Cross River State, CrossRiverWatch gathered that the leadership of the ruling party and the state governor were not happy that Mr. Igini had announced that the party primaries were riddled with irregularities. They considered Igini too resolute and strict and also suspected that he was sympathetic to the Ndoma Egba/Jedy Agba faction of the party and wanted him out of the state.

A source in Abuja office of INEC told CrossRiverWatch that a meeting was held with the First Lady, Patience Jonathan in Aso Rock where complaints of Igini’s alleged closeness to the opposing faction in the state PDP and his activist disposition were posed as potential danger to the party’s fortunes in the state.

This may have contributed largely to finding his name on the redeployment list.