INEC disputes giving contract to APC governorship candidate.

The Independent National Electoral Commission has denied awarding a contract for the printing of sensitive election materials to the All Progressives Congress governorship candidate in Adamawa State, Senator Aishatu Dahiru Ahmed.

Festus Okoye, National Commissioner and Chairperson of INEC’s Information and Voter Education Committee, signed a statement on behalf of the commission announcing this.

The statement partly read, “Our attention has been drawn to a news report that the commission awarded a contract for the printing of sensitive election materials to Aishatu Dahiru Ahmed. It was alleged in the report that she owns Binani Printing Press Limited.

“Procurements in the commission go through open competitive bidding and Binani Printing Press Limited was one of the security printing companies that applied to print security documents for the commission.

“After inspecting the company’s facility and carrying out due diligence at the Corporate Affairs Commission, the commission was satisfied that they are qualified printers with the requisite technical capacity, security consciousness and expertise in printing security documents.

“However, Aishatu Dahiru Ahmed was not listed as one of the Directors of Binani Printing Press Limited.”

In order to support Nigerian printers and promote economic development, according to Okoye, the commission opted to print all of the security documents for the 2023 General Election in the nation.

The commission declared that it would keep exercising due diligence in its procurement procedures.