Civil rights advocacy group, Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has called on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to ensure that its election result viewing portal (IREV) and the bimodal voter accreditation system (BVAS) are utilized and working perfectly during the November 11 governorship elections in Kogi, Bayelsa, and Imo states.

The group’s National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, who gave the charge in a press statement
in Abuja on Monday, warned the electoral umpire that its credibility will be at stake if it goes ahead to conduct the off-cycle elections without the optimal use of the IReV and BVAS

We have watched with unfathomable amazement, the attempt, by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to once more hoodwink Nigerian voters in Kogi, Imo and Bayelsa States into believing their propaganda that ‘all the glitches experienced during the general elections of February 2023 had been taken care of’,” Onwubiko said.

“We are aware that the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, expressed its readiness to conduct the November 11th governorship election in Bayelsa, Kogi, and Imo states, respectively.

“INEC Acting Director, Voter Education and Publicity, Mary Nkem, gave this assurance at a People’s Townhall on Election Security in Abuja. Nkem said all the glitches experienced during the general elections earlier in the year had been taken care of.

She said INEC has put a lot of plans in place to guarantee early deployment of sensitive materials to polling units, including ad hoc officers camping near polling units a day before the exercise

Rather than people moving from the local government headquarters to the various polling units, they are moved closer to the PUs (polling units) where they are going to work. So, I can assure you that, God willing, we will deploy early,” he said, quoting the INEC official.

But the group however, dismissed INEC’s re-assurance, describing it as ‘mere paperweight’ promise going by the fact that ‘around September 16th 2022, INEC had told Nigerians that it was committed to the deployment of the bimodal voter registration system (BVAS) and IReV for the 2023 election and to transmit the results of all elections electronically but INEC failed to fulfil this promise during the general poll as only the National Assembly election results were eventually uploaded, thus refusing to do same for the Presidential poll.’

“When it got to the Election Petition Tribunal, INEC argued that it wasn’t legally obliged to do so and the court glibly conceded to this claim by INEC which stands in contrast to the verbal commitment made by INEC before the conduct of the last General election,” the statement added

The advocacy group also expressed its reservations that the current hierarchy of INEC can convince any voter of their commitment to a transparent election so long as the electronic transmission of election results in real-time is not unambiguously legalised in the electoral act.

“It will be another wonder of the world if the ethically challenged electoral management body can deliver transparent, free and fair poll given the ambivalence of the officials regarding the adoption of the use of technology such as the transmission of election results in the real-time but would rather opt for manual collation which gives room for manipulations and electoral heists