…As Venezuela blackout enters 4th day***

The Saturday State Assembly elections in Kogi East was indicated to have claimed three lives, while four others were hospitalised across the senatorial district, an eyewitness highlighted.

However, the Commissioner of Police in the state Hakeem Busari, in a swift reaction said that the command recorded only two deaths in the exercise, but acknowledged that there were widespread allegations of thugs in police uniforms attacking people.

Eye witnesses report stated that after a peaceful and orderly take-off of the exercise in the morning, violence erupted simultaneously across the district during counting of ballots and collation with ballot box snatching.

In Olamaboro Local Government, a Community Leader of Inele, Mr Abuh Simon, was shot in the chest by gun-trotting political thugs, who had earlier snatched ballot boxes from a nearby community of Ugojo-Ubalu.

Simon was said to have been shot by the thugs along with two others, James Matthew and John Agada, allegedly on the order of one David Onoja.

Mathew and Agada survived, but Simon was however, was unlucky as he was hit directly on the chest which led to his death.

The two survivors, who sustained gunshot injuries, were said to have been rushed immediately to the hospital.

An eye-witness, Mr ThankGod Onu-Moses, National Chairman, Inele District Development Union (IDDU), allegedly told NAN that thugs snatch ballot boxes.

“We were there when some people ran down to tell David Onoja that PDP was leading in Unit 004 Ugojo-Ubalu. He immediately left with some thugs in a Toyota Hilux Van straight to the polling unit.

Onu-Moses said Onoja and the thugs got there, shot into the air, violently snatched the ballot boxes from Ugojo-Ubalu unit 004 and came back to Inele unit 002.

He further alleged that the deceased community leader, who along with Matthew and Agada, approached Onoja to inquire about the boxes when he (Onoja) thinking they were out to challenge him, signaled the thugs to open fire on them.

Also at Atuma in Ankpa Local Government, two persons were allegedly killed while another two, including a woman, sustained various degrees of injuries in the milieu that ensued as a result of forceful hijack of ballot boxes

Thugs in police uniforms were also said to have invaded Atuma village shooting indiscriminately and in the process, killed one person and injured two others including a woman; and took the ballot boxes away.

The police commissioner, who promised to get to the root of the matter, called for calm.

He said: “We have already told political actors to embrace peace.

“You do not have to kill your brothers because you are looking for position. We will, however, parade arrested suspects at the end of election.’’ 

Meanwhile, Venezuelans woke up to a fourth day of an unprecedented nationwide blackout on Sunday, leaving residents concerned about the impacts of the lack of electricity on the South American country’s health, communications and transport systems.

President Nicolas Maduro has blamed the blackout on an act of “sabotage’’by the U.S. at the Guri hydroelectric dam, but experts say it is the outcome of years of underinvestment.

Guaido invoked the constitution to assume an interim presidency in January, arguing that Maduro’s 2018 re-election was fraudulent.

Guaido has been recognised as Venezuela’s legitimate leader by the U.S. and most Western countries.
In spite pressure from frequent opposition marches and U.S. sanctions on the country’s vital oil sector, Maduro is not open to negotiations on ending the political impasse and seems intent on trying to stay put, said Elliott Abrams, the Trump administration’s envoy for Venezuela.

The blackout, which began on Thursday afternoon, increased frustration among Venezuelans already suffering widespread food and medicine shortages, as the once-prosperous OPEC nation’s economy suffers a hyperinflationary collapse.

Food rotted in refrigerators, people walked for miles to work with the Caracas subway down, and relatives abroad anxiously waited for updates from family members with telephone and internet signals intermittent.

“What can you do without electricity?” said Leonel Gutierrez, a 47-year-old systems technician, as he carried his six-month-old daughter on his way to buy groceries.

“The food we have has gone bad.”

At hospitals, the lack of power combined with the absence or poor performance of backup generators led to the death of 17 patients across the country, NGO Doctors for Health said on Saturday.

Reuters was unable to independently verify the figure, and the government’s Information Ministry did not respond to requests for comment.

Power returned briefly to parts of Caracas and other cities on Friday, but went out again around midday on Saturday.

The outage is by far the longest in decades.

In 2013, Caracas and 17 of the country’s 23 states were hit by a six-hour blackout, while in 2018 eight states suffered a 10-hour power outage, government officials said at the time.