GHOST AGENTS: We’ll Maintain Online Accreditation of Party Agents for All Forthcoming Elections—INEC Chairman
Oru Leonard
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), has disclosed that the technological innovation it introduced in the Anambra Governorship election, especially in the online accreditation of polling and collation agents nominated by political parties will be maintained for all forthcoming elections, including the 2023 General Election.
The INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu who said this at a meeting with the Resident Electoral Commissioners (RECs) to review the Anambra Governorship election, discuss the ongoing Continuous Voter Registration (CVR), preparations for forthcoming elections and other related matters, noted that the arrangement sanitized the electoral process and made the identification of ghost party agents easier.
He stated that for some time now, dedicated portals were created by the Commission to handle different aspects of the electoral process, adding that the nomination of candidates by political parties, including the uploading of nomination forms, is now done online, as well as the accreditation of election observers and the media.
According to him, “In addition, and for the first time in the history of the Commission, the accreditation of polling and collation agents nominated by political parties was done online. This has ensured that all such agents were provided with identification tags bearing not only their party logos, names and other personal details but personal photographs as well.
“In all, the Commission issued 63,745 identification tags to agents of the 18 political parties that sponsored candidates for the election. This has sanitized the process and made the identification of ghost party agents easier. We will maintain the same arrangement for all forthcoming elections, including the 2023 General Election”, he said.
Speaking on the Continuous Voter Registration (CVR), he said the Third Quarter of the exercise will commence in January next year, adding that the Commission is working on concerns around devolution of the exercise beyond State and Local Government offices to enable more citizens to register, as well as time for collection of the Permanent Voters’ Cards (PVCs), noting also that a comprehensive schedule for both activities will be issued early in the new year.
Meanwhile, in view of the forthcoming Area Council Elections in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) scheduled for 12th February 2022 involving 68 constituencies to elect 6 Area Council Chairmen and 62 Councillors, the INEC Chairman said, “A total of 42,986 Nigerians completed their CVR in the FCT, the Commission has diligently cleaned up the data using our new Automatic Biometric Identification System (ABIS) to weed out multiple registrations.
“As a testimony to the efficacy of our ABIS process, 14,665 (34.1%) multiple registrations were detected and rejected. Consequently, the number of new valid registrants in the FCT is 28,321. Added to this figure are requests for transfer of registrations to FCT, replacement of lost or damaged PVCs and update of voter records, making an overall total of 39,208 new PVCs to be printed.
I am glad to report that all the PVCs will be available for collection from 6th January 2022 until 4th February 2022″.
On the June 8, 2022 Ekiti Governorship election and the July 16, 2022 Osun Governorship election as well as the eight pending bye-elections involving three Federal Constituencies (Jos North/Bassa in Plateau State, Akure North/Akure South in Ondo State and Ogoja/Yala in Cross River State) and five State constituencies (Shinkafi in Zamfara State, Ekiti East I in Ekiti State, Akpabuyo in Cross River State, Pankshin South in Plateau State and Giwa West in Kaduna State), the INEC Chairman charged political parties to abide by the provisions of the law, INEC’s regulations and guidelines as well as their Constitutions and guidelines.
