Okonkwo: polls postponement an abortion of pregnancy

Annie Okonkwo has described the postponed election as the “height of executive recklessness and insensitivity by a national agency reposed with so much trust and responsibilities”.

Okonkwo, in a statement, by his media aide, Collins Ugwu, said: “In fact, it’s akin to a dangerous indulgence by a midwife abandoning an expectant mother already in labour, whose pregnancy is overdue and whose delivery she has assured will be timely and safe.

“It is bizarre and perhaps sinister that a responsible INEC, with a four-year mandate to prepare and organise a delicate national elections, could wheel the electorate into their proclaimed ready theatre, not to announce a happy delivery, but an abortion of joy, because suddenly, their cherry team of ‘midwives’ did not have enough hand gloves.

“May I ask if the enormous financial strain to the national treasury, political parties, critical stakeholders and candidates did not mean much to INEC, couldn’t the emotions, pains and sacrifices made by the charged electorate to exercise their franchise persuade them better?

“I, therefore, caution with every sense of responsibility that our weak institutions should not be made weaker by conducts that tends to erode their already challenged integrity, because no one dances on the cliff and not expect a fatal fall.”