Nigeria’s Civil Society Situation Room has asserted that the introduction and use of election result viewing portal by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in the last Saturday’s Governorship election in Ondo State has further shown an improvement in the nation’s electoral process.
Introduced in August 2020, INEC Result Viewing (IREV) portal allows Nigerians to view polling unit results in real-time the moment voting ends on election day.
It was reported that results of all polling units in 11 out 18 local government areas in the state were uploaded on the portal after about 8 hours of the close of poll.
Commenting on this, the Situation Room in statement signed by its alternate Chairman, Esther Uzoma noted that INEC had further increased transparency in the electoral process with the introduction of IREV.
“The introduction and use of the Z-pad for uploading of collated polling results is a major improvement of the election process, because of the heightened transparency that this has brought to our elections.
“Upon completion of the voting process, Situation Room observed a 100% complete upload of results to the INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV) in 11 of the 18 LGAs in Ondo State, after about eight hours of close of polls.”
While speaking on the general conduct of the election, the Situation Room noted that the Ondo governorship witnessed an improvement when compared to that Edo adding that INEC’s processes improved and was mostly hitch-free.
It however noted that the menace of vote-buying was still high while voter turnout was relatively low.
“Situation Room commends the security services for the professionalism exhibited throughout the duration of the election. A major drawback however, was the inability of security operatives to intervene in the blatant cases of vote-buying and selling, reported in most polling units during the election.
“Reports received by Situation Room showed that vote buying was evident in a number of polling units and largely went unchecked. Voters were seen selling their votes for sums ranging from N4,000 and N5,000, to N7,000, depending on the political parties or location.
“The improper positioning of voting cubicles and ballot boxes in some polling units observed, made it easier for party agents to deduce patterns of voting as the secrecy of the ballot was not observed.
“Situation Room calls on INEC, security agents and other stakeholders to seek out more practical ways of enforcing punitive measures against offenders, to serve as a deterrent to political actors and the electorate, moving forward.” the statement read.
It further renewed its call for more effective enforcement of election laws that prohibit vote buying and other electoral offences and for quick legislative action to be taken on the passage of the Electoral Offences Commission Bill.
