An Election observer of the Democratic Union of Africa, Peter Mac Manu, has disclosed that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) of Nigeria has done its possible best to ensure a successful election.
According to him, elections involve a lot of processes that require the inclusion of everyone, from the electoral commission to the electorate, to play their roles well in order to make the exercise successful.
He revealed that while Nigeria’s election had some challenges, which includes delay especially in the provision of election logistics and some scenes of violence, the INEC has fulfilled its mandate.
“On the eve of the election, we expected a peaceful orderly election, and as a matter of fact, I would say INEC has done its bit, because there are other major stakeholders, who are to contribute their bit… On my rounds to the polling units, it was orderly. The day before, at dawn, at the registration centers, where in the morning, election materials were distributed to the poll units, the vehicles were there, the drivers were there.”
Peter Mac Manu
Despite the relative calmness observed at polling centers, Mr Mac Manu indicated that some factors, such as the financial crisis and fuel shortages, may have had an impact on the INEC and possibly contributed to the delay in the deployment of logistics to some polling stations. Nonetheless, he noted that INEC promised to extend the time for the closing of voting beyond 2:30pm should there be a delay, and this promise was fulfilled.
“You have to take all these into a holistic consideration to be able to know whether some polling stations were late in opening. But these are some of the reasons.”
Peter Mac Manu
The former Chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) emphasized that Nigeria has a huge voter population of 93 million and about 93% collected their Permanent Voters Cards, as such, the election is a huge task. Nevertheless, he explained that when one breaks it into the 36 states, the 774 local government areas and trickles it down to the 176 thousand plus polling stations, then it becomes manageable.
With that, he highlighted that election is a total cooperation from all stakeholders such as media, security, political parties and civil society groups and iterated that the INEC did its best.
Delayed commencement of voting in some areas
On his part, Ghana’s Ambassador to Nigeria, Rashid Bawa, indicated that the elections took place in some parts of Northern Nigeria on Sunday, February 26, 2023 due to late deployment of logistics. He expressed that logistics for the elections were deployed about one hour later than scheduled.
“What I observed is that the materials, the logistics arrived a bit late. The election was supposed to start around 8:30, but most of the logistics were deployed at the various polling stations around 9:30.am. The logistics arrived a bit late, and therefore in some parts of the north, elections took place but they just ended those elections.”
Rashid Bawa
Mr Bawa however disclosed that on Saturday, despite the delay in the provision of the logistics, the election ended quite swiftly due to the availability of multiple polling stations.
“Once it started, within 4-5 hours, they ended it. Everybody voted because they created a lot more polling stations, therefore they have a fewer lines of human beings… By 2:30, which is the period within which they are supposed to stop voting, most of the people have voted, and sorting had started. And by 3 o’clock, they have already counted, and they have already registered the results on the various sheets to be uploaded on the portal.”
Rashid Bawa
The High Commissioner noted that another thing he observed was that INEC strictly gave out directives that “no media house should call out any of the results on their media platform”, and these directives were obeyed.
It will be recalled that Nigerians went to the polls to elect a new President on February 25, because the outgoing President, Muhammadu Buhari, is stepping down after completing his second term.
According to reports, this year’s elections saw a massive turnout of enthusiastic voters, yet the process has been marred by some challenges.
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