Ahead of the November 2 local government elections, Chairman of the Nasarawa State Independent Electoral Commission (NASIEC), Barrister Ayuba Usman Wandai has read the riot act to the 13 electoral officers drawn across the state, charging them not to be answerable to any person.

The NASIEC Chairman handed down the directives while flagging off a one-day train-the-trainer workshop for electoral officers which held at the headquarters of the commission in Lafia on Saturday.

Wandai warned the electoral officers against undermining the goal of the commission to conduct a credible and acceptable local government elections.

“I want to call on you, to note that as electoral officers of the NASIEC in the various local government areas, as far as this local government elections is concerned, you are in charge of your local government. I don’t want you to go and be answerable to anybody. You are not answerable to anybody. You are in charge of your local government. You should behave like electoral officers of this commission,” he said.

He emphasized that the management and staff of the Commission are in charge of the elections and are not subordinate to anybody.

“We are in charge of this elections. We are not subordinate to anybody as far as this election is concerned. We are an independent commission. I expect that you stamp your foot. Let nobody tell me so, so person said that. You are not answerable to any so, so person. You are only answerable to us here. Because we sent you out to do your job. If you have any challenge, report directly to us,” he stated.

Wandai informed the trainees that NASIEC has commissioners mandated to suprintend over the six designated zones, imploring the electoral officers to stamp their feet and not to bow to any outside pressure.

“If you do that, you will be doing us a lot of good. You will be doing yourselves a lot of good. Like I have always maintained, it is how we go about discharging our duty that will attract respect to you as staff of this commission and to us as management of this commission. Just go ahead and conduct an election that is credible and acceptable to the people of Nasarawa State,” he said.

Wandai described training of staff as a core mandate of the NASIEC, disclosing that so far, most of the staff went on various training courses across the country.

“For us NASIEC, training is at the core of our activities. Since the last elections, we have sent most of our staff on training courses across the country. We always ensure that we train our staff for this day so that they will not be rusty. The election management world is ever changing, with new techniques evolving every day,” he added.

He pointed out that NASIEC stands tall among its peers in the country for being the most ardent election observer in the country, with the commission observing all elections organized either by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) or sisters SIECs.

“We have always borrowed and learned a lot of innovations from these outings. At every point in time, we consider the training of our staff as very paramount because it is the core for us as far as exercising our mandate is concerned. Because we have to update our electoral officers to be able to carry out there work effectively and also with dedication and knowledgeable about what they are supposed to do on the field,” he said.

While noting that the training is also a train-the-trainer session, Wandai said it is expected that all that they would learn from here, the electoral officers will go back to their various local governments and impact it on the ad hoc staff to recruited from the various local governments.

“We have brought a new system of recruitment of ad hoc staff. It is our hope and prayer that we will do this seamlessly. We have also brought a new innovation on the training of our ad hoc staff. We have identified some members of the academic community from across tertiary institutions in the state, who will partner with the various electoral officers to impact this training,” he said.

Wandai stated that resource persons for the training were carefully chosen after considering the depth of know and experience on election management.

Earlier, in a welcome address, NASIEC Commissioner, Planning, Research, Statistics and Strategy, Hon. Mukthar Mamman Angbashi, said the training is meant to impact useful knowledge to the 13 electoral officers drawn across the state.

“We as the commission in charge of organizing the election, routinely during elections, provide avenue like this to refresh and reorient our staff for the task ahead. Because from time to time, there are always new innovations that we need to appraise them to live up to the task.

Angbashi urged the trainees to pay attention and to take home holistically all that they would learn during the session.

“Probably, some of you have been part of the past elections. But this time there are a lot of changes that have taken place. We enjoin you to be attentive, ask relevant questions and put into use the knowledge that you are going to acquire,” he stated.