Meanwhile, an attempt by two officials of the INEC in Edo State to re-capture the data of the Esama of Benin, Chief Gabriel Igbinedion, at his residence, in Benin City, the state capital, has landed them in police net.
The development apparently prompted the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the state to call for the prosecution of all persons involved in alleged conduct of voter registration at the residence of Chief Igbinedion.
The Edo State vice chairman of the PDP, Owere Dickson Imasogie, who stood in for the state chairman, Chief Dan Orbih, at a press conference on Tuesday , said the supposed culprits must be brought to book, as a way of assuring the electorate that the 2011 elections would be free and fair.
The two INEC voter registration officials were arrested for allegedly abandoning their registration unit at the Civil Service Training Centre, GRA, Benin City and went to Chief Igbinedion's residence to re-register him after the Direct Data Capture (DDC) machine failed to capture his data during an earlier registration at the registration unit.
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Nigerian Tribune gathered that Chief Igbinedion had, last week Saturday, gone to the registration unit in the area, near his residence, to be registered, but after his data was fed into the DDC machine, the machine shut down as a result of low battery, and the Benin high chief was asked to go with the assurance that he would be issued his voter card on Monday, which was two days ago.
It was also learnt that on Monday when Chief Igbine-dion was expecting to receive his voter card, two INEC officials walked into his residence and requested to re-capture him again, because their system malfunctioned and, therefore, they could not recover his data from the system.
However, Mr Lucky Eboh-Onokwe, an aide to Chief Igbinedion, in a statement on Tuesday, debunked what he described as the rumour doing the rounds as it affected the Benin high chief.
According to Eboh-Onokwe, Chief Igbinedion went to the polling centre close his residence on Saturday, "did all the registration formalities and left in the hope of collecting his voter card the next day, as it is the practice with the INEC officials.
He said Chief Igbinedion was approached on Monday that they were unable to print out his voter card due to malfunctioning of their machine and would, therefore, want re-do the exercise."
When contacted, the Public Relations Officer of the Edo State police command, Mr Peter Ogboi, said the police were working in conjunction with the INEC, adding that it was only INEC that could establish if there was any wrongdoing in the registration process and inform the police officially.
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