The Civil Society Election Situation Room wishes to underscore the importance of the Supplementary Elections designed to bring to an end the “inconclusive” governorship elections in Imo State. This supplementary election is to take place in four different Local Government Areas on 6 May 2011. They include Mbaitoli, Ngor-Okpala, Oguta and Orji in Owerri North Local Area. We note that INEC was constrained to order this step in response to a pattern of serious and verifiable violations of the Electoral Act that accompanied the initial Governorship Election in the State on 26 April 2011. These violations included violence perpetrated against INEC staff and voters by identified persons, unlawful diversion of electoral materials, and other irregularities contrary to the Electoral Act. These events reflect poorly on the politicians who perpetrated them, the INEC staff responsible for managing the electoral process in the affected LGAs and in Imo State and on the law enforcement agents who failed to prevent or police them. INEC and the law enforcement agents bear the responsibility to ensure that there is full investigation and legal accountability for the unlawful conduct that forced the Imo State Governorship Elections of 26 April to be inconclusive. INEC has an obligation to ensure that the Supplementary Elections in Imo State are conducted in a manner that is manifestly free, fair, credible, transparent and devoid of the violations that crippled the governorship elections of 26 April. To ensure this, INEC must take steps to ensure that any staff liable to be investigated or against whom there are complaints of mis-conduct in the April 26 voting, are not involved in the conduct of the Supplementary Elections. The security services should take similar steps with respect to law enforcement personnel. Specifically, the Inspector-General of Police must take steps to publicly demonstrate and guarantee the impartiality of Police personnel deployed in the State for the Supplementary Elections. Together, the Inspector-General of Police and the Chief of Army Staff should also ensure that the rules of engagement given to their personnel for these Supplementary Elections guarantee that the men and women under their command will be civil to and do not intimidate or harass voters or take sides in undermining free, fair and credible balloting in the four locations in which voting will occur. As its contribution to enhancing the credibility of the Supplementary Election process in Imo State, the Civil Society Election Situation Room will work with observers from different local and international election observation teams to deploy a high powered election observation team in Imo State to monitor the voting, counting, collation and final announcement of results. To complement this deployment, the communications hub of the Civil Society Election Situation Room will be re-located to Imo State from 5 May 2011 until the completion of this process. The Civil Society Election Situation Room calls on all participants in the Supplementary Elections in Imo State to maintain the peace respect the rules of the process and publicly commit to subject themselves and their supporters to the supremacy of the will of the people. Issued 2.30 p.m. Wednesday, May 4 2011 For: Elections Situation Room : Clement Nwankwo Executive Director Policy and Legal Advocacy Centre (PLAC) Tel: 0803 8899999 Dr Jibrin Ibrahim Executive Director Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD) Tel: 0803 4001200