2023: Situation Room asks INEC to conduct voter education on new polling units

The Nigeria Civil Society Situation Room says the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) should carry out extensive voter education to raise awareness on the newly-created polling units.

The organisation said this in its report on the FCT area councils’ election released on Monday during a meeting in Abuja.

Situation Room said during the FCT election, its observers noticed various issues, such as the late deployment of personnel and materials, malfunctioning of the bimodal voter accreditation system (BVAS), and vote-buying.

“Situation room observers and partners noted a general late deployment of the personnel and materials across the FCT. As at 9:30am, poll officials have only arrived in 68.3 percent of polling units observed across the six area councils. There was widespread malfunctioning of the bimodal voter accreditation system (BVAS) causing delays in accreditation and voting in most places, the device failed to detect facial and authenticate voters,” it said.

“Also, all officials mostly displayed inadequate knowledge of the accreditation device, BVAS, leading to continuous automatic log out of the operator. Situation room observers reported many incidents of vote-buying and selling at the polling unit level in the FT area council elections. Apart from the usual cash distribution, voter buying reportedly took the form of digital transfers in some locations.”

The organisation, therefore, made recommendations to improve the electoral process ahead of the Ekiti, Osun and 2023 elections.

“Situation room calls on INEC to work towards improving its logistics arrangements and early commencement of polls in the upcoming elections,” it said.

“Ensure proper and effective configuration of accreditation devices and ensure that poll officials are properly trained on the use of the BVAS.

“Carry out extensive voter education to raise awareness on the new polling units credited in its expansions of access to polling units exercise in 2021, as well as the procedure for allotting voters to these new locations.

“Review the accessibility of polling units with registered voters who are PWDs and also ensure the deployment of assistive materials to these locations.

“Political parties should engage in voter mobilisation to address the trend of diminishing voter turnout.

“Conduct party processes and primary elections fairly, particularly ahead of the two off-cycle governorship elections in 2022 and 2023 elections.”