The Akwa Ibom State headquarters of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Uyo, yesterday witnessed journalists’ anger.

The media practitioners were invited through text messages to collect their accreditation materials, to enable them cover the general elections, including Saturday’s Presidential and National Assembly elections across the state.

The uproar started when the state Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), Barr. Austin Eni Okojie, emerged after a long wait by the responding journalists and announced that “only 60 journalists have been carefully selected to cover the elections in the state,” adding: “If your name and your medium is not in the approved accreditation lists, you better leave the premises and start going.”

“I did the task of selecting and accrediting the journalists alongside your state chairman of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Elder Patrick Albert, from the original list he submitted to me,” Barr. Okojie insisted.

Thereafter, the anxious journalists, who asked that the names of the accredited journalists be read out to all, became more outrageous when they eventually saw that the lists of those accredited were not up to half of the number of practicing journalists in the state.

The furious journalists then demanded for immediate return of their passport photographs and letters of nomination from their various media organisations, which the Commission officials ignored.

It took the intervention of security agents at the premises to cool the hot nerves of the protesting journalists, who described the selection exercise as “bias”.

News Express reports that about 170 media practitioners drawn from various media organisations, including local, regional and national medium, are registered by the state NUJ, out of which the state REC picked only 60 to cover the elections, both at the state INEC headquarters and in the 31 Local government Areas, including the vast riverine areas of Akwa Ibom State.

•Photo shows INEC

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