Focused on the task of delivering a credible election in 2023, the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on Thursday stepped up his series of consultative meetings with stakeholders by holding an interactive gathering with members of the Civil Society Organisations and the media.

With only 120 days to the election, Professor Yakubu assured the stakeholders that INEC remains focused on its goal to deliver a free, fair and credible election that every Nigerian would be proud of in 2023. He urged the media to continue supporting INEC for successful elections in 2023, adding that the media has a critical role to play in combating misinformation and fake news that could disrupt the elections.

“We believe that the best antidote to fake news is greater openness and greater transparency. So, we appeal to the media to help us fact check, particularly some of the postings on the new media intended to either delegitimise those who conduct elections or to delegitimise the institution that conducts elections, with the ultimate aim of undermining the process.

“As I said, we will always remain open and provide information. I know you’re all professionals in your own right, but I have also learned on this job for some time now that a professional journalist is as effective as the amount and quality of information available to him or her. We will continue to provide you with the information necessary for transparent and credible elections”. he said.

Prof. Yakubu also called for media collaboration for the further clean-up of the country’s voter register and seamless collection of permanent voter cards.He assured his guests the Commission would be having more meetings with Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) aand the media as the election days draw near. On Wednesday, similar meeting was held with the leadership of the 18 registered political parties fielding candidates in the 2023 election.

With commendations for the CSOs, the INEC boss said: “we have achieved so much working together for electoral reform, citizens’ participation and inclusivity in the electoral process, voter education, campaign for peaceful elections., the advocacy against electoral malpractice such as vote buying and multi-stakeholder engagements on election technology and the management of logistics. Yet a lot of work still lies ahead”, he stressed.

“With exactly 120 days to the 2023 General Election, we are clearly heading down the home stretch. At a similar consultative meeting with political parties yesterday, I reassured Nigerians of our commitment to credible elections supported by appropriate technology. Voters will be accredited by means of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS). There will be no incident form. Results will be transmitted to the INEC Result Viewing (IReV) portal in real time on Election Day. We are committed to ensuring that the 2023 General Election is transparent and credible, reflecting the will of the Nigerian people.

“You may recall that after consultation with stakeholders, the CVR commenced with the online pre-registration on 28th June 2021 and continued for thirteen months until its suspension on 31st July 2022. During that period, the Commission gave Nigerians regular weekly update showing the progress of the exercise nationwide, including analysis of the distribution of voters by age, occupation, gender, and disability for our planning purposes and for public information.

“At the end of the exercise, 12,298,944 Nigerians successfully completed the registration as new voters. You may recall that the Commission had repeatedly assured Nigerians that our process of cleaning up the register is robust. After a rigorous cleaning-up of the data using the Automated Biometric Identification System (ABIS), a total of 2,780,756 (22.6%) were identified as ineligible registrants and invalidated from the record, among them are double/multiple registrants, underaged persons and outrightly fake registrations that fail to meet our business rules. Consequently, the number of valid registrations (post-ABIS) is 9,518,188. Hard copies of the full details of the distribution of the new voters are included in your folders for this meeting. A copy has already been uploaded to the Commission’s website and social media platforms.

“The Commission deployed thousands of diligent staff for the CVR exercise and the vast majority of them discharged their duties conscientiously. Unfortunately, a few of them did not. The fictitious registrations were carried out by some of our Registration Officers involved in the field exercise and could easily be traced. Each registration machine is operated using an access code tied to a dedicated e-mail assigned to a staff. There is therefore an audit trail that gives the total number of persons registered by each official involved in the registration exercise. In some cases, some of them made as many as 40 attempts or more to register one fake voter. As a result, the Commission has so far identified 23 Registration Officers involved in this unethical conduct and disciplinary action has commenced. We shall continue to protect the integrity of our voters’ register. It is pivotal to credible elections. It is also a national asset and easily the largest database of citizens in Africa and one of the largest in the world.

“The 9,518,188 new voters have been added to the existing register of 84,004,084 voters. The PRELIMINARY register of voters in Nigeria now stands at 93,522,272. It is preliminary because Section 19(1) and (2) of the Electoral Act 2022 requires the Commission to display the hard copies of the register of voters for each Registration Area (Ward) and Local Government Area (and simultaneously publish the entire register on the Commission’s website) for a period of two weeks for scrutiny, claims and objections by citizens not later than 90 days to a General Election.

“Accordingly, in the next few days, the Commission will print 9,352,228 pages of the register. The hard copy will be displayed for each of the 8,809 Registration Areas (Wards) and 774 Local Government Areas nationwide while the entire register will be published on our website for claims and objections as required by law. The display of the physical register will take place at the designated centers from Saturday 12th – Friday 25thNovember 2022. Further details, including the procedure for filing claims and objections, will be released by the Commission next week. I would like to appeal to all Nigerians to seize the opportunity of the display to scrutinize the list and help us to clean it up further so that the final register of voters for the 2023 General Election can be compiled and published.

“The Commission is also working hard to ensure the completion of printing of remaining PVCs for new voters as well as those that applied to transfer or the replacement of their lost or damaged cards. In the coming days, we will also inform Nigerians of the detailed plan to ensure a seamless collection of the PVCs. We are aware that Nigerians expect an improvement in the procedure for PVC collection. Since the end of the CVR in July this year, we have been working to ensure that citizens have a pleasant experience when they come to collect their cards, including collaboration with CSOs for a pilot exercise in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT). We are exploring the possibility of scaling up the FCT pilot for nationwide application

Updating the Voters Register
Prof Yakubu gave an update on the voters register to the media: “At the end of the exercise, 12,298,944 Nigerians successfully completed the registration as new voters. You may recall that the Commission had repeatedly assured Nigerians that our process of cleaning up the register is robust. After a rigorous cleaning-up of the data using the Automated Biometric Identification System (ABIS), a total of 2,780,756 (22.6%) were identified as ineligible registrants and invalidated from the record, among them are double/multiple registrants, underaged persons and outrightly fake registrations that fail to meet our business rules. Consequently, the number of valid registrations (post-ABIS) is 9,518,188. Hard copies of the full details of the distribution of the new voters are included in your folders for this meeting. A copy has already been uploaded to the Commission’s website and social media platforms.

“The Commission deployed thousands of diligent staff for the CVR exercise and the vast majority of them discharged their duties conscientiously. Unfortunately, a few of them did not. The fictitious registrations were carried out by some of our Registration Officers involved in the field exercise and could easily be traced. Each registration machine is operated using an access code tied to a dedicated e-mail assigned to a staff. There is therefore an audit trail that gives the total number of persons registered by each official involved in the registration exercise. In some cases, some of them made as many as 40 attempts or more to register one fake voter. As a result, the Commission has so far identified 23 Registration Officers involved in this unethical conduct and disciplinary action has commenced. We shall continue to protect the integrity of our voters’ register. It is pivotal to credible elections. It is also a national asset and easily the largest database of citizens in Africa and one of the largest in the world.

“The 9,518,188 new voters have been added to the existing register of 84,004,084 voters. The PRELIMINARY register of voters in Nigeria now stands at 93,522,272. It is preliminary because Section 19(1) and (2) of the Electoral Act 2022 requires the Commission to display the hard copies of the register of voters for each Registration Area (Ward) and Local Government Area (and simultaneously publish the entire register on the Commission’s website) for a period of two weeks for scrutiny, claims and objections by citizens not later than 90 days to a General Election.

“Accordingly, in the next few days, the Commission will print 9,352,228 pages of the register. The hard copy will be displayed for each of the 8,809 Registration Areas (Wards) and 774 Local Government Areas nationwide while the entire register will be published on our website for claims and objections as required by law. The display of the physical register will take place at the designated centers from Saturday 12th – Friday 25thNovember 2022. Further details, including the procedure for filing claims and objections, will be released by the Commission next week. I would like to appeal to all Nigerians to seize the opportunity of the display to scrutinize the list and help us to clean it up further so that the final register of voters for the 2023 General Election can be compiled and published.

“The Commission is also working hard to ensure the completion of printing of remaining PVCs for new voters as well as those that applied to transfer or the replacement of their lost or damaged cards. In the coming days, we will also inform Nigerians of the detailed plan to ensure a seamless collection of the PVCs. We are aware that Nigerians expect an improvement in the procedure for PVC collection. Since the end of the CVR in July this year, we have been working to ensure that citizens have a pleasant experience when they come to collect their cards, including collaboration with CSOs for a pilot exercise in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT). We are exploring the possibility of scaling up the FCT pilot for nationwide application

“It is clear to the Commission that as the General Election approaches, there will be need for more frequent meetings with CSOs. We hope that in spite of your busy schedules, you will continue to honour our invitation” he said.

Responding, the National President of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Chris Isiguzo, commended INEC for the successful conduct of the Ekiti, Osun, and Anambra governorship elections, saying that the feats demonstrated the Commission’s readiness to conduct credible elections in 2023.

Represented by the Union’s National Treasurer, Mr Dele Atunbi, the NUJ President also commended INEC for the various technological innovations in the country’s electoral process, “which has now given the electorate the opportunity to truly choose their leaders.”

His words: “The introduction of technology in the process of conducting elections has shown that INEC has given the people a right to choose their leaders. With the leadership recruitment process in Nigeria under your watch and leadership, we can say authoritatively that it is now for the public to choose their leaders.

“You have done your own part in the leadership recruitment processes, and you have done so well. We are proud of it and we call upon Nigerians to seize this opportunity to protect democracy and their own interests.

He urged political actors to play by the rules and sell their party’s manifesto without tantrums, “which is not in the best interest of Nigerian politics.”

Comrade Isiguzo also urged the media to be professional in their practice to help combat fake news and the use of hate speech or unprintable words during campaigns.