Chairman, Cross River Independent Electoral Commission, Dr Ekong Boco, said 10 political parties will participate in Saturday local government elections in the state.

Mr Boco stated this on Thursday in Calabar during the commencement of distribution of sensitive materials to the 18 local government areas in the state.

He, however, debunked the speculations that the materials had already been sent to the council areas.

Mr Boco, who showed everyone the ballot papers before the commencement of distribution, urged political parties to keep supporting the commission until the election was ‘done and dusted’ on Saturday.

He said, “We will be using 3,281 polling units, as approved by Independent National Electoral Commission, 9,843 ad-hoc staff, 460 supervisors, 18 returning officers and 198 collation officers.’’

The CROSIEC chairman said that the ad-hoc staff were trained from October 25 to October 27, including the returning officers and ward collation officers, expressing hope that they would conduct themselves well during the exercise.

“We want everyone to see that the process is transparent and the commission is clean,” he said.

Mr Boco further stated that the manual voting would commence by 8 a.m. and end by 2 p.m.

In his remarks, the State Chairman of Inter party Advisory Council, Effiom Edet, said that the council observed the process by the commission, expressing the confidence that the election would be free, fair and credible.

“We have not noticed in any way where results were signed for any political party and so we want to let the people know that something like that cannot happen,” he said.

Friday has been declared a public holiday by the state government to ensure effective preparation for the polls.

(NAN)