The Inspector General of Police, (IGP) Kayode Egbetokun, and the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC have stated their plans to ensure credible fair and transparent elections in Kogi Imo and Bayelsa States this weekend.
Revealing his plans when he spoke as guest on Channels Television’s people’s Townhall on election security in Abuja on Sunday, the IGP said the Force is adequately prepared for the exercise, assuring voters that the elections will be hitch-free.
According to him, the polls will take place in only three states of the Federation, stating further that the Force will draw personnel from across the remaining 33 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) to support the already existing security architecture.
“We are ready for this election, we have been able to deploy adequately for this election. In Bayelsa, we will be covering 2,224 polling units and we have enough men and resources to cover those polling units,” he stated.
“We have also made adequate arrangements for both Imo and Kogi. We have done our threat assessments, and we already know how to carry out our deployments which we have already done.
“I want to assure you that the police and other security agencies are ready for this election and we are sure it is going to be hitch-free.”
The IGP stated that the deployment which has already started will be completed by Friday, about 24 hours before the governorship elections in the three states.
‘History Of Violence’
Historically, the three states have had records of violence in previous elections, with fears that violence could mar the smooth conduct of the polls.
There have also been fears of voter apathy, with concerns raised about the role of security agencies in safeguarding lives and properties during the elections.
Admitting that Kogi, Imo, and Bayelsa are volatile states, the IGP said he is aware of what happened in the last general elections.
“We are going to leverage on our understanding of what happened in the last election. We want to do many things differently in this election because we have more resources to deploy for this election.
“We are very comfortable that the election this period in these three states is going to be better than the previous elections,” he said.
On its part, INEC which was also a guest on the same programme assured Nigerians that polling unit results will be uploaded real-time on the Result Viewing Portal (IReV).
INEC’s Acting Director of Voter Education and Publicity, Mary Nkem, said all the glitches experienced during the general elections earlier in the year had been fixed.
She said INEC has put a lot of plans in place to guarantee early deployment of sensitive materials to polling units and ad hoc officers camping near polling units a day before the exercise.
“Rather than people moving from the local government headquarters to the various polling units, they are moved closer to the PUs (polling units) where they are going to work. So, I can assure you that God willing, we will deploy early,” Nkem said.
According to her, sensitive materials will be moved from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) vaults to Kogi, Bayelsa, and Imo by Monday.
The official also said the Commission conducted mock accreditation some three weeks ago in all three states “to confirm the functionality of the BVAS, accredit voters as well as upload of polling unit results to the IreV and these were optimally carried out”.
Asked whether the challenges with the IReV in the 2023 presidential election earlier in February had been identified and resolved, going into the three off-cycle governorship polls, the INEC official said, “Sure, we had a post-election review, and all of these things that went wrong were identified.
“Well, there was a glitch, technology (glitch), and it will interest you (to know) that if you go to the IReV now, all those results are on the IReV. It is just that they could not be uploaded in real-time, but they were uploaded later on, and we can assure Nigerians.”
This assurance, she added, was because “even the mock exercise that we conducted, within two hours, all the results were on the IReV”.
Nkem encouraged all political parties with candidates in the forthcoming polls to have records of the results of all the polling units to monitor collation.
