Dickson orders monarchs to sign peace pacts with candidates

TRACKING>>Bayelsa State Governor Seriake Dickson has directed traditional rulers and chairmen of Community Development Committees (CDC) to hold peace meetings with political stakeholders and party candidates to ensure violence-free elections in the state.

Dickson said the community leaders should sign peace pacts with the candidates and their parties to confine their activities within the outcome of the meetings.

The governor, in a statement by his Special Adviser on Media Relations, Mr. Fidelis Soriwei, further called on the paramount rulers to be vigilant to ensure that strange faces were not harbored in their communities during the period of the election.

Dickson stressed that the state would not allow the influx of strange faces brought in as political thugs to foment crisis during the election.

He said: “Based on the outcome of the State Security Council meeting, all paramount rulers, CDC chairmen are directed to hold peace meetings with candidates and party leaders in their various communities, particularly those that normally have political violence. We don’t want violence in any community because of the elections in the state.

“They should call the politicians in their areas, and candidates and then get binding undertakings from them.

“I am directing them to sensitize communities to reject any strange or unknown face brought in as thugs by any candidate or politician to disturb the peace of the communities.

“The traditional rulers and CDC chairmen are directed to mobilize their communities to ensure that only those who are registered voters from their communities are harbored in their communities for purposes of this election; no unknown faces by any political party will be tolerated. We stand for peace, we must have a culture of voting peacefully.”

Dickson also said that it was important for the people to recognize that election as a civilian operation requires the police and civil forces to play their assigned responsibility while the military operates at the outer corridor.

He explained the military, who could be assigned the responsibility of escorting sensitive electoral materials because of the terrain should neither handle electoral materials nor intimidate voters.

“Our people should know that by the laws of this country, the duty of the military is to be at the outer corridor.

“Election is a civil operation, with the police and other civil forces playing their constitutional roles, while the military because of our terrain are given support services to escort materials.

“They are not to handle any material, they are not to intimidate anybody”.