TELL Magazine

Delta State Governor, Ifeanyi Arthur Okowa says he would be returned for a second term in office as he cast his vote 8:40 am in today’s governorship and House of Assembly elections. Okowa, in company with his wife, Dame Edith Okowa, and his children, voted in different polling units in their Ward 2 polling centre at Omi Primary School, Owa-Alero, Ika North-East local government area of the state. 
Speaking to journalists immediately after casting his votes at Unit 3, the governor stated that “by the grace of God, I will emerge victorious; I have partnered with Deltans, I have worked with them, and by God’s grace, a lot of them will vote for me.”
Okowa however stated that “the only thing we are doing is to ensure that those who planned to use thugs to disrupt the elections will be handled by the security agencies because, aside plans to disrupt the elections, it would be a no contest situation”. According to him, “so far, the electoral process is peaceful, and we pray to God that it remains peaceful. People are coming out in their large numbers to cast their votes; a lot of votes have been cast already despite the fact that it is still very early in the day. We hope that the voting process remains peaceful across the state”.

Okowa believed that the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, has done well, positing that everything appeared to be working well. “But the day is just starting, and of course, we are still perfecting our system but, the best thing is the effectiveness of the response to handle any challenge as they occur by the INEC officials.”
He said INEC did well to deploy a lot of youth corps members at each polling unit which made the job easy as they assisted themselves, and expressed hope that such would be replicated across the state.
It was learnt that voting commenced at exactly 8 o’clock as scheduled.