Just like all good school would subject their final year students to a mock examination before exposing them to external test of their knowledge, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on Saturday subjected the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System Machines (BVAS) procured for the 2023 General Election to test in the 36 states of the federation.
Just like all good school would subject their final year students to a mock examination before exposing them to external test of their knowledge, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on Saturday subjected the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System Machines (BVAS) procured for the 2023 General Election to test in the 36 states of the federation.
Several voters who participated in the exercise expressed confidence in the voting process during the mock accreditation. The exercise took place in twelve polling units per state round the 36 states of the federation. The exercise went on smoothly across Nigeria.
INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu at a meeting with Resident Electoral Commissioners (RECs) in Abuja on Friday 27th January,2023 said that having taken delivery of and tested the BVAS machines procured for the general election, the next step “is to conduct field tests across the country involving actual voters in readiness for nationwide deployment.”
The Commission conducted a similar mock accreditation exercise ahead of the Ekiti and Osun State governorship elections.
Prof. Yakubu at the meeting said 12 polling units have been designated in each State of the Federation and four in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) on the equality of the country’s 109 Senatorial Districts for the exercise.
Perhaps reacting to the open invitation by INEC to the media and observers to witness what some political observers tagged “game changer” – (the BVAS) ,the Nigeria Postal service Office at Area 10,Abuja was like the venue of an international engagement. It was a harvest of both local and international journalists and Observers.
Monitoring of the exercise was not left in the hands of minions and goons, Chief Executives of media organisations left their comfortable offices to observe the exercise. Mr. Osita Okechukwu, Director General Voice of Nigeria (VON) was one of media chiefs. He said:” we came here to monitor the INEC mock election and to see the BVAS in action. Some of us celebrated the 2022 Electoral Act where BVAS is now mentioned in law. We thanked Me. President for signing it into law. The BVAS and all electronic devices that makes it possible for election results to be transmitted electronically which makes the BVAS vote rigging vaccine.
“So, it is important to witness it. We mobilized our four man crew from Voice of Nigeria to monitor what is going on here,” he said.
Ambassador Ojineme Enakeme of the African Youth Union Commission observed that there are lots of observers but the electorates are not coming wondering whether they were not properly mobilise or they are reserving their energies for the real elections.
“Last year about 1000 electorates at Karshi ward were disenfranchised because both facial and fingers were not captured. I am happy today because out of the three electorates two were capture instantly, the third one that had issue with capturing was eventually captured”, she stressed.
Abdullahi Mohammed who was initially not captured was captured after some minutes. He said he was happy and eager to vote on the d – day.
Obieze Joel who lives in Jiwa area of the Territory but has his polling center at the NIPOST Area 10 office said he came to the polling centre based on the information he got concerning the mock exercise but was told after presenting his card to the official that ;” my card has been migrated to another polling unit within the NIPOST office and that the polling unit is not being used for the mock exercise”.
He said he was told a text message would be sent to voters whose polling unit has been migrated.
Hon. Musa Ali Goza said he came to see what was going on but was told his polling unit was not selected for the exercise. He said the BVAS is indeed a game changer because ;” somebody who had been accredited earlier came the second time for accreditation and the BVAS detected it.
For Kabiru Bala, the Presiding Officer ,the exercise is going on well. ” So far, so good. You know when they call something ‘mock’, it is a trial. The first person, fine; the second person, fine; the third person is when we faced a little Challenge because of his finger print. But like they told Nigerians, the essence is to see how we can improve”.
In Oyo State, Dr Adeniran Tella, Resident Electoral Commissioner, REC, in Oyo State, said the success of Saturday’s mock accreditation in the state is an affirmation that the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, BVAS, has come to stay.
“It is the game changer and we are making use of it in this coming general elections for authentication, verification, uploading and accreditation,” Tella said.
The REC, however, called for inclusive participation of all citizens in the ongoing political system and electoral process, urging everyone to be involved.
He said that the electoral process should not be left in the hands of election administrators alone.
“But, we must continue to engage ourselves by seeking solutions to identified problems confronting election processes in the country,” the REC said.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Lagos State conducted its own mock accreditation exercise in 12 Polling Units across six Local Government Areas to test the functionality of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) ahead of the polls. The exercise which began at about 8:30 am and ended at 2:30 pm recorded a massive turnout of voters across the selected LGAs.
The State Resident Electoral Commissioner, Mr Olusegun Agbaje, who monitored the conduct of the exercise in Surulere, Ikeja and Somolu LGAs gave satisfactory remarks on the functionality of the BVAS.
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