CDD inaugurates election analysis centre, unveils plans to combat fake news

The Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD) has unveiled an election analysis centre (EAC) for the 2019 general election.

Speaking at the opening ceremony in Abuja on Thursday, Idayat Hassan, CDD director, said the essence of the centre is to “infuse confidence in the whole elections”.

She said the centre would counter fake news, disinformation and provide live telecast.

“The whole essence of the centre is to infuse confidence in the elections,” Hassan said.

“We are deploying GPS enabled apps to ensure that they are giving us accurate information, especially where they are and beyond that we are also providing vigorous analysis of previous Nigerian elections from 1999 to 2015.

“We are not just deploying observers, we have also documented all the trends. Beyond that also, we have a fake news centre, this centre will be reacting to fake news as it being shared on social media, to try our best to combat it.”

The CDD director said since it is the first time Nigeria is experiencing 20 years of democracy without an interruption, the centre will ensure it helps in strengthening democratic process in Nigeria.

The analysis center”We will be putting out observation report and matching it with what previously held to see if there’s a pattern,” she said.

“For the elections we only want peace, to ensure that peace reigns in the elections.”

In his remark, David Young, US deputy chief of mission, said his country would support Nigerians working hard to ensure a peaceful election and also assist in combating fake news and hate speech.

“We are very excited about the elections and this example of citizens democracy at work here in Nigeria,” he said.

“Both fake news and hate speech are very worrisome phenomenon of our time, and we want to support you in combating all kinds of fake news that get reported.

“It’s unhelpful and undermines the spirit of people being able to peacefully go to the polls and make sure that their votes are counted.

“Hate speech must be condemned at all sides, it’s simply unacceptable that people of whatever party or background can speak out in ways that inflame and cause people to be hateful to others.

“And we have seen examples from that across the political spectrum and it needs to be condemned at all sides.”

Philip Baker, Canadian high commissioner to Nigeria, said the EAC centre can be used to build democracy for Nigeria’s future.

“I was honored to be at the signing of the peace accord, where every presidential candidate signed on the peace accord. This is a huge step for Nigeria,” he said.

“What I like about this notion by CDD is the the ‘one-stop-shop” that says it all, all the analysis in one place, bringing that efficiency and coherence to data so that it can be used for so many good things, including continuing to build democracy for the future. This is democracy on the move in Nigeria.”