Former Deputy National Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives, Honourable Yekeen Nabena, has expressed concern over the assurance by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to transmit, electronically, results of the off-season governorship elections fixed for November 11 in Kogi, Bayelsa and Imo state.
Speaking with journalists, the APC chieftain who incidentally is from Bayelsa said the average Nigerian takes with a pinch of salt the promise emanating from the Commission given the experience in the last general elections.
Tribune Online checks revealed that while ruling last month on the petition filed by the Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi, the Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal affirmed the INEC’s discretion to determine the mode of election result transmission.
The five-member panel, led by Justice Haruna Tsammani, referred to Sections 52 and 65 of the Electoral Act 2022, which granted INEC the freedom to prescribe the method of transmitting election results during the poll.
It further dismissed the petition filed by the Labour Party and its presidential candidate, Peter Obi, which sought to annul the victory of President Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress based on the alleged “failure” of INEC’s Results Viewing Portal to electronically upload election results in real-time.
Further checks revealed that ahead of the November election, the Commission has since announced October 14 for mock accreditation of voters using the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) and upload of polling units results to the INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV).
Nabena, however, argued that Nigerians are tired of promises and expectations that would not be met by the electoral umpire.
Apart from assurance on the security of voters, he noted that INEC should come clear whether IReV would again be jettisoned so that people can protect their votes.
He said:” First and foremost, the security system should be the focus in Bayelsa State. And INEC should come out plain this time around. Is it BVAS or do we just do whatever we want to do while INEC takes it from there. There is no clear direction.
“So you can do whatever you want to do then INEC can come back and do what they like. They are telling us INEC said they don’t have the power to transmit. INEC must have a clear direction so that voters will know this is the system. So that everybody can protect his or her votes. Not that somebody will go to the government House and write results for INEC. So tell us, are you going to transmit the result from polling units? Or what are you going do? Are you going to use BVAS? Tell us from day one. Let there be a guideline and an understanding that this is what we should expect. Not the one court will say INEC can come up with anything they want. ”
The former national publicity scribe who claimed that the ruling People’s Democratic Party in Bayelsa is divided amongst itself expressed confidence that his party candidate, Timipre Sylva would win next month’s election.
“We are going to win. The PDP people won’t tell you the truth. In their campaign council, if you look at it, you will find out that their bigwigs like Senator Seriake Dickson is not there. They will not tell you.
“Because the governor too has abused the Senator who is from the same Senatorial District with him. Like I said before, my Senator from my Senatorial District made the mistake of bringing somebody like that as his successor. He doesn’t have to. He is sad that the projects that he was doing have been abandoned by Diri and he is doing his own. So what you are seeing in Bayelsa is just a couple of unfinished projects here and there.”
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