Avarice says Anambra Poll will be safe.

Ahead of the November 6 gubernatorial poll in Anambra state, the Senate minority leader, Enyinnaya Abaribe, has called on residents to come out en mass and cast their votes.

He stated this during his appearance on Channels Television’s Politics Today. According to the Senator, he noted that the poll would be safe amid fears of low turnout of voters.

Abaribe said: “I don’t think low voter turnout is peculiar to Anambra state,” he said. “For a long time in Nigeria, many people have not bothered to vote because they have always felt that their votes do not count.

“I was in Anambra last week, and we went around, to the market, to the universities, and we met business leaders. I also spoke, and I went to the radio stations, and everything I was doing was to tell people to come out and vote because it’s going to be very safe and that people should not be afraid that there will be a lot of violence; there won’t be.

“From everything that we’ve seen, from the interaction we’ve had, there may be an even far more turnout than you expect.

“The skirmishes that happened earlier, what we thought was that it was designed to make people not come out to vote, for a particular end. And that end I don’t think is going to work. Because we have now been there; we’ve talked to people.”

Meanwhile, the IPOB had ordered a “total lockdown” of the South Eastern states for five days, including the slated day for the poll, unless its leader, Nnamdi Kanu, is released.

The IPOB leader is being tried on an amended seven-count charge of alleged treason, secession and terrorism; Kanu has, however, pleaded “not guilty”. The Federal High Court in Abuja has adjourned its trial to November 10, 2021, when his lawyers will be expected to raise objections to the charges.