We’re 90% ready for Kogi guber polls – INEC

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has assured that it is 90 per cent ready for the Nov. 11 governorship election in Kogi.

Dr Gabriel Longpet, the Kogi INEC Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), made this known in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria on the telephone in Lokoja on Monday.

Longpet also disclosed that the commission has recruited over 15,000 ad hoc staff to help it in the smooth conduct of the polls.

“We have 3,508 polling units and each of these units will be manned by four ad-hoc staff aside from the security personnel that will be around to ensure peaceful conduct of the election.

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“We shall deploy more staff and BVAS in densely populated polling units to complement those we are going to use.

“To be precise, we are going to use more than 900 backup BVAS.

“This is because some polling units have more than 1,000 to 2,000 registered voters, and we have to split the number by creating more voting points for easy voting.

“This becomes imperative as we don’t want to give room for anything that will delay the process.

“As soon as there is a report of any BVAS failure or challenge, we shall provide another one and configure it to that polling unit for smooth continuation of voting,” he said.

On whether the commission would use helicopters or choppers for distribution of voting materials in hard-to-reach areas, the REC said he was not aware of such a plan but “we will ensure that all the polling units get their materials on time”.

Longpet further explained that the BVAS had been deployed to the 21 local government areas in the state in readiness for the election.

“I can say we are 90% prepared. If not for the fact that we are waiting for the sensitive materials such as the ballot papers and the result sheets, I would have told you we are 99.9% prepared,” he said.

On security, the commissioner said flash points, which the security operatives identified, would be well taken care of in order to have a hitch-free election.

“The security agencies have always given us the assurances. On our part as a commission, there is nothing we can do. We only rely on them, because we are not in control of the security,” he said. (NAN)