Breaking: INEC Reviews Conduct Of 2023 Election, Seemed Poised To Address Perennial Complaints From Political Parties

From Princely Onyenwe

The meeting held Wednesday at the INEC Commission’s conference room in Abuja featured the INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, along with the civil liberty organizations, Members of the commission, in a meeting with Leaders of Political Parties to Review the 2023 General Election.

Critical stakeholders made presentations while the media was also granted the opportunity to present reports as scheduled below.

The President of the President of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, Comrade Chris Isiguzo MFR who was present at the 2023 General Election Review Meeting with the Media stated that this review meeting is an invaluable opportunity for introspection and improvement.

In his words to his colleagues, “As President of the NUJ, I urge each one of you to seize this moment to contribute thoughtfully, honestly, and constructively. Our collective efforts will shape the future of media involvement in Nigeria’s electoral process and, by extension, the health of our democracy.

However, the NUJ Boss affirmed that there are many positive aspects of the 2023 General Election. At the same time, there were challenges.

The Commission is aware that aspects of the election are being litigated at the various election petition tribunals. While we are careful not to touch on issues that are clearly sub-judice, it is appropriate to review the election broadly as enumerated on the agenda for this meeting contained in your folders.

More specifically, and from your practical experience of reporting or analysing the election, we would like to hear your observation and suggestions on the processes and procedure for:

i.Accreditation of media organisations

ii.Access for journalists to voting and collation locations on Election Day

iii.Conduct of pre-election activities by the Commission: Continuous Voter Registration (CVR), voter access to polling units etc

iv.Logistics for the movement of personnel and materials

v.Recruitment and training of ad-hoc staff

vi.Conduct of regular and ad hoc officials during the election

vii.Security during the election

viii.The role of technology in voter accreditation and result management; and

ix.Any other suggestions that will improve the conduct of future elections.

In his address, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu stated the following as captured and compiled by 9News Nigeria reporters.

The Hon. Chairman INEC, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu and Members of the Commission in a Meeting with Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) on the review of the 2023 General Election at the Commission’s conference room, Abuja.

1. I am delighted to welcome you all to this meeting. Unlike previous regular engagements, this meeting is intended to focus more on the 2023 General Election by way of introspection, stocktaking, review and evaluation. This is one of the best ways to continue to improve the electoral process. As I said on several occasions, since we commenced the review meetings three weeks ago, the Commission welcomes diverse opinions about the election insofar as their purpose is to improve the future conduct of elections and to consolidate our democracy.
2. Since the 2019 General Election, we have worked together with the National Assembly, civil society organisations and other stakeholders for the improvement of the electoral process. We were meticulous in our preparations for the election and there have been many positive developments in this regard. One area is the repeal and re-enactment of the Electoral Act 2010 into the Electoral Act 2022. The new law provides a period of 180 days for political parties to conclude their primaries and submit the names of candidates and the political parties took advantage of it for the 2023 General Election. This enabled the Commission to commence the process of producing the sensitive materials for the election in good time. I am glad to report that the printing of all sensitive and non-sensitive materials for the 2023 General Election was entirely done in Nigeria. This is the first time in 44 years since the transition to democratic rule in 1979 that this great step was taken and achieved, in spite of the record number of 93.4 million registered voters and over five hundred million ballot papers, result sheets and other documents for the five categories of the main elections and supplementary polls. For this reason, the 2023 General Election was held as scheduled for the first time in the last four electoral cycles without a postponement arising from the non-arrival of materials.
3. Furthermore, we were also able to expand voter access to polling units for the first time since the initial delimitation exercise in 1996. Similarly, we introduced many technology-based innovations, including the physical registration and online pre-registration of voters using the INEC Voter Enrollment Device (IVED, the various portals for the nomination of candidates, party agents and the accreditation of observers and the media. We also collected and published data on the distribution of voters not only by age and occupation but also by disability. Within the limits of available resources, we also tried to provide such inclusivity materials as braille jackets and magnifying glasses for some categories of voters with disabilities.
4. Nevertheless, as you are aware, there were many challenges encountered before and during the elections. The severe cash and fuel situations were compounded by the perennial insecurity nationwide. Their impact on our deployment plans, compounded by the behaviour of some of our own officials in the field, made logistics management particularly challenging. The deployment of thugs by some political actors made election day administration difficult in a number of places. While voter accreditation using the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) was very successful, the uploading of results to the INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV), especially for the presidential election, encountered a glitch as explained in our statement released by the Commission on 26th February 2023. The Commission is aware that this matter is currently the subject of litigation and would reserve its comments for now. Nevertheless, the performance of the technology deployed for the election is part of the ongoing review of the 2023 General Election.

Let me also seize this opportunity to welcome those who are attending this meeting for the first time as leaders of political parties. In particular, I would like to welcome the Chairman of the Youth Party (YP) to this meeting following its re-registration by order of the Supreme Court. With this development, Nigeria now has 19 political parties.

For the 2023 General Election, political parties played a leading role in the election and the electoral process. Collectively, they sponsored 36 presidential candidates and their running mates; 837 governorship candidates and their running mates; 1,100 senatorial candidates; 3,127 candidates for federal constituencies (i.e. House of Representatives) and 10,231 candidates for state assembly constituencies.

The Commission also printed identity cards for 1,642,385 polling and collation agents nominated by political parties to represent them at polling units and collation centres. Following the conclusion of the election, seven political parties won senatorial seats, eight parties in the House of Representatives and nine parties in the State Houses of Assembly.

While the Commission is working on the electronic register of election results as provided by Section 62(2) of the Electoral Act 2022, a comprehensive list of elected candidates for the 1,491 constituencies distributed by name, constituency, political party and gender will be uploaded to the Commission’s website this afternoon for public information.

The Commission appreciates the role of political parties through the Inter-Party Advisory Council (IPAC) in voter education within the limits of available resources both during off-cycle and the general election. Your robust engagement with the National Assembly contributed a lot to the 4th and 5th alterations to the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and the enactment of the Electoral Act 2022.

At the same time, I must also acknowledge the perennial complaints from some political parties that the power of incumbency is used in some States to restrain some parties and candidates from access to public facilities for media campaigns and outdoor advertising through exorbitant fees or outright denial.

This often leads to the mutual destruction of advertising materials such as billboards, resulting in altercation and violence involving supporters of opposing political parties.

This matter will be discussed at the next meeting of the Inter-Agency Consultative Committee on Election Security (ICCES) scheduled for Friday this week. Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, INEC Chairman assured.

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