{"id":34883,"date":"2020-10-09T13:20:21","date_gmt":"2020-10-09T13:20:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/?p=34883"},"modified":"2020-10-09T13:20:29","modified_gmt":"2020-10-09T13:20:29","slug":"ondo-2020-inec-allays-makindes-fears-says-oau-vc-not-returning-officer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/?p=34883","title":{"rendered":"ONDO 2020: INEC allays Makinde\u2019s fears, says OAU VC not returning officer"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i3.wp.com\/www.ripplesnigeria.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/Mahmood-Yakubu1.jpg\" alt=\"Paucity of funds may affect conduct of Bayelsa, Kogi polls - INEC\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has described as false a statement by the Governor of Oyo State and PDP National Campaign Council, Seyi Makinde that the Chief Returning Officer for Saturday\u2019s governorship election in Ondo State is Eyitope Ogunbode.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Mr Makinde in a press release on Thursday stated that the polls may not be free and fair because of Mr Ogunbodede, who is an ally of the incumbent Governor, Rotimi Akeredolu, a candidate of the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.ripplesnigeria.com\/tag\/APC\/\">All Progressives Congress (APC)<\/a>&nbsp;who is seeking a reelection in the Saturday\u2019s election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>INEC National Commissioner and Chairman (Information and Voter Education Committee) Festus Okoye in a statement said Mr Ogunbodede who is also the vice-chancellor of Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU) has not been appointed the returning officer of the election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cFor the avoidance of doubt, the Returning Officer for the Ondo Governorship election is not from Ondo State and not from the University mentioned in the said press conference,\u201d Mr Okoye said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWhile the Commission will not be drawn into speculations relating to the performance of its constitutional and statutory functions, it is imperative to set the records straight for the benefit of the people of Ondo State and the integrity of the electoral process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt is the sole responsibility of the Commission to appoint a Returning Officer for the Ondo Governorship election and does not share this responsibility with any individual, group or Political Party.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The commission added that its primary goal was to ensure the conduct of a free and fair election.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has described as false a statement by the Governor of Oyo State and PDP National Campaign Council, Seyi Makinde that the Chief Returning Officer for Saturday\u2019s governorship election in Ondo State is Eyitope Ogunbode. Mr Makinde in a press release on Thursday stated that the polls may not be [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v20.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>ONDO 2020: INEC allays Makinde\u2019s fears, says OAU VC not returning officer &raquo; WatchDog Plus Media<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/?p=34883\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Odofin\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/?p=34883#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Politics\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/?cat=10\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":3,\"name\":\"ONDO 2020: INEC allays Makinde\u2019s fears, says OAU VC not returning officer\"}]}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"ONDO 2020: INEC allays Makinde\u2019s fears, says OAU VC not returning officer &raquo; WatchDog Plus Media","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/?p=34883","author":"Odofin","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/?p=34883#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Politics","item":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/?cat=10"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"ONDO 2020: INEC allays Makinde\u2019s fears, says OAU VC not returning officer"}]}]}},"rttpg_featured_image_url":null,"rttpg_author":{"display_name":"Odofin","author_link":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/?author=2"},"rttpg_comment":0,"rttpg_category":"<a href=\"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/?cat=10\" rel=\"category\">Politics<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has described as false a statement by the Governor of Oyo State and PDP National Campaign Council, Seyi Makinde that the Chief Returning Officer for Saturday\u2019s governorship election in Ondo State is Eyitope Ogunbode. Mr Makinde in a press release on Thursday stated that the polls may not be&hellip;","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34883"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=34883"}],"version-history":[{"count":-4,"href":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34883\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=34883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=34883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/watchdogplusmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=34883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}