(a) to protect life and property;
(b) to preserve law and order;
(c) to prevent and detect crime; and to co-operate with Civilian authority and other security organs established under this Constitution and with the population generally.”
In view of the provisions of section 41 of the Act, Parliament appears to have envisaged that it is the Police which should maintain law and order at all polling stations during polling in a Presidential Election. It provides:
“41(1). Where there is no Police Officer to maintain order in a rural polling station and the necessity to maintain such order arises, the Presiding Officer shall appoint a person present to be an Election Constable to maintain order in the polling station throughout the day.
(2) A Presiding Officer may only appoint a person other than a Police officer to be an election Constable under subsection (1) when there is actual or threatened disorder, or when it is likely that a large number of voters will seek to vote at the same time.
(3) There shall be appointed at every polling station established under subsection (2) of section 33 of the Commission Act one person in order to ensure the orderly and prompt entrance of the voters into their proper polling station within the center.
(4) When an election constable has been appointed by a Presiding Officer, the Constable shall take an oath in the Form O-.C. in the sixth schedule to this Act before commencing to discharge his or her responsibilities as election constable.
(5) Every Presiding Officer who has appointed an election constable at a polling station shall state publicly his or her reasons in the space provided for that purpose in the polling report book.
(6) A Presiding Officer of a polling station located in an urban area may, where required for the purposes of sub-section (2) appoint a Police Officer to maintain order in the polling station.
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