Minister of Labour and Employment, Sen. Chris Ngige, and his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), have complained about the disappearance of some electoral materials meant for the House of Assembly election in Ihiala 1 constituency and Awka South 1 constituency.

The Minister, who spoke with journalists on Saturday, said the stolen electoral materials were kept in the custody of the local government chairmen before they disappeared.

Ngige said: “So far, there are reported cases of pilfering of INEC materials at Ihiala I and Awka South I, where our party agents said materials kept in custody of the local government chairmen were no longer complete in the morning of the election at the RAC.

“We have petitioned INEC through the REC, Prof Nwachukwu Orji, bringing his attention to that situation otherwise the elections in those two places would have been compromised ab initio. So we are on standby; we are waiting for the votes to be counted in many places and for election results to come in.”

The Minister noted that the fact that Anambra State was not conducting a governorship election affected the election.

He urged the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to look into the issue of card reader which, he noted, still rejects people’s finger prints.

He added: “Nonetheless, it is a very important election as it affords Anambra people the opportunity to form one arm of the government which is for making state laws. It is also the ambit of governance that is nearer to the people.”