The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, has assured Nigerians that it is fully ready for the 2023 general elections starting with the Presidential and National Assembly elections slated for Saturday, 25th of February, 2023.
An Assistant Operations Officer of INEC, Mr. Enite Oru gave the assurance during an awareness campaign programme on Radio Delta, Melody FM Warri, sponsored by the National Association of Seadogs, NAS, aka Pyrates Confraternity, Rainbow and Escravos Decks, on Monday, 20th February, 2023.
Mr. Oru said the INEC was fully prepared for Saturday’s elections, having completed the training of personnel and security agents, and had also commenced the distribution of non-sensitive materials to various locations across the country.
The radio enlightenment programme tagged “Voters Awareness in the 2023 General Elections in Nigeria,” featured an interactive phone-in segment with some members of the DBS publics.
He reassured that the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) would be used for accreditation during the elections, describing the BVAS as an electronic device designed to read permanent voter cards (PVCs) using voters’ fingerprints to ensure that they are eligible to vote at designated polling units.
On doubts about the possibility of the BVAS being manipulated before accreditation, Mr. Oru urged the electorate to verify if the BVAS has zero figures before accreditation and voting begin.
He said only registered voters with voter cards from 2011 to 2022 would be able to vote, even if the card is defaced but warned those without voter cards to stay away from polling units so as to avoid embarrassment and or arrest.
Mr. Oru disclosed that INEC had taken steps to enhance voters access to polling units by ensuring that a polling unit does not exceed 750 voters, noting, however, that the extra voters at polling units, which hitherto had more than 750 names, had been transfered to the nearest polling unit to give Nigerians a hitch free experience on election days.
He added that in order to ease the process, the Commission had sent bulk text messages (SMS) to Nigerians who would vote in new polling units and urged eligible voters to confirm their voting locations ahead of an election day from INEC’s website “www.cvr.inecnigeria.org”. While responding to questions on vote buying, the INEC official urged the electorate to resist selling their votes as such an act would mortgage their future.
Mr. Oru disclosed that the Commission had carried out several enlightenment campaigns on the ills of vote buying, and working with security agents to deal decisively with culprits. He urged Nigerians to come out enmasse to exercise their franchise on Saturday, assuring them that their votes would surely count.
