By Dennis Agbo
The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, has disclosed that the infrastructure it has put in place for the 2023 general election cannot allow rigging to take place during the elections.
INEC named those infrastructure to include the INEC Voter Enrolment Device, IVED, which eliminates voting by identity theft through the use of another person’s Permanent Voters Card, PVC; the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, BVAS, which does not allow for multiple voting and electronically transmit results from polling units and the INEC Result Viewing Portal, IREV, which makes ward collation result sheets available for people to see.
INEC further said that the 2022 electoral act has strengthened its operations and gives the commission more confidence to deliver free and fair results to Nigerians.
INEC Administrative Secretary in Enugu State, Engr. Chidi Nwafor made the disclosures at ‘Yiaga Africa RUN to WIN’ town hall meeting for young men and women in Enugu state contesting the 2023 general elections.
Nwafor also gave credit to the young persons and women in Nigeria, whom he said scaled-up their electoral participation process through their voter registrations, restating the INEC Chairman’s disclosure that 7.2 million new registered voters or 76.5 percent were young people between 18- 34 years, while there is a slightly higher number of female (4.8 million or 50.82 percent) than male (4.6 million or 49.18 percent). He further explained that in terms of occupation, 3.8 million (40.8 percent) are students.
In his goodwill message at the town hall meeting, Nwafor said: “IVED, BVAS, IREV are new innovations in the electoral process as well as Electoral Act 2022. The Electoral Act 2022 has further strengthened the conduct of General Election. It behoves on the Leadership of Political Parties to create an enabling environment/or Party Constitution to accommodate young people in vying for elective positions.”
Organizers of the Town Hall meeting, Yiaga Africa, a Civil Society group with interest in electoral reforms, assured the youth candidates of different political parties that it would mobilize support to enable them make an impact and win in their various constituencies in the 2023 general elections.
Programme officer of the group, Olaniyan Sanusi, however decried a decrease of youth participation in the forthcoming 2023 elections, disclosing that youth candidacy in the 2023 polls stood at just 4,398 out of a total of 15,336 candidates representing a paltry 28.6 percent of the total number of candidates aspiring to occupy the office of President, Governors, National Assembly and State Assembly seats.
Sanusi however disclosed that the group had already mapped out plans to give technical support to the selected youth candidates so as to enable them compete favourably with their elderly colleagues.
Yiaga Africa with support from OXFAM-Voice in Nigeria will be giving technical support to selected youth candidates. We are going to support their campaigns with media visibility. We’re going to provide the platform for them to sell themselves to the electorate,” Sanusi said.
One of the participants and the All Progressive Grand Alliance, APGA, House of Representatives candidate for Enugu North/South constituency, Mr. Nonso Nnamani called on political parties to provide technical, financial and logistics support to young male and female candidates during the campaigns.
Firstword24 