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Rose Ejembi, Makurdi
There was pandemonium in Mbalom ward of Gwer East Local Government Area (LGA) of Benue State after some armed political thugs allegedly burnt all electoral materials for the council.
Some skirmishes were also witnessed in Gboko and Tarka LGAs of the state.
The Mbalom incident, Sunday Sun gathered, happened in the early hours of Saturday while members of the sleepy community were preparing to go and exercise their civic responsibility.
Sources from the area disclosed that as soon as the thugs invaded the community, they started shooting sporadically in the air before setting the RCM Primary School, Aya, housing the materials ablaze.
The Electoral Officer for the LGA, Mrs Ngunan Yongo, who confirmed the incident, said the materials were yet to be distributed to polling units in the ward before the hoodlums attacked.
Yongo lamented that the entire electoral materials for the community were burnt in the mayhem.
INEC’s Resident Commissioner (REC) in Benue State, Nentawe Yilwatda, while confirming the incident, said election did not hold in Mbalom as well as two other council wards of the state.
The REC gave the names of the council wards to include Mbalom, Yandev North and Manger II.
He said the affected wards are in Gwer East, Gboko and Tarka LGAs, respectively, stressing that burning of election materials and holding of INEC ad-hoc staff hostage were witnessed in the areas.
Yilwatda said elections in the affected areas would be rescheduled and conducted at a later date.
