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Anambra guber: Late arrival of INEC officials, malfunctioning BVAS may mar exercise

Anthony Iwuoma
The Anambra State gubernatorial election is underway but was characterised by late arrival of the Independent Electoral Commission, INEC, officials at most polling units, and malfunctioning of some of the Bimodal Voters Authentication System, BVAS, machines.
It was gathered that INEC officials failed to arrive several polling units by the 8am mark when the exercise was billed to commence and thereby delayed  accreditation of voters.

However, voters turned out in large numbers and patiently waited for the INEC officials to arrive.

In some areas, accreditation did not start till about 10 am.

Also, YIAGA Africa noted that in 87 per cent of polling units, INEC officials failed to arrive by 7:30 am.

Besides the late arrival of officials and materials, voters complained that  some BVAS machines malfuntioned.

For instance, it was observed at PU 005 in Otuocha 1, Eri Primary School II, Anambra East LGA, that voting was yet to start as at 10.30am due to malfunctioning of the BVAs, which, according to the presiding officer at the unit, Abong Mathews, could not authorise fingerprints and facial recognition.

In a similar development, there was no BVAS machine at all in PU006, Isingwu Primary School, Umunze, Orumba LGA, as at 11:18 am, further delaying accreditation of voters.
The INEC Chairman, Prof Yakubu Mamud, had assured that the BVAS had a dual capacity for fingerprint and facial authentication to prevent the use of stolen permanent voter cards.

These initial hitches notwithstanding, there was s calm and peaceful atmosphere in spite of the fear occasioned by the sit-at-home order issued by the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, which the oro-Biafra group later rescinded.

However, INEC has assured that the election results would be uploaded from the 5,634 polling units to its result-viewing portal, which would be activated as from 3:30 to 4 pm when polling units must have have done with counting their results.

 

informed Nigerians, especially those paying keen interest on the Anambra governorship election on when to visit its Election Results Viewing Portal for results.

The Commission explained that the portal is basically for the viewing of results and is not expected to display other forms of information.

INEC assured

The electoral umpire, however said that those kin on seeing the results from the portal must have to wait until the collation have been done manually.

It said the result-viewing portal would only .

Speaking to DAILY POST on how the portal functions and when Nigerians should expect results to start entering the portal, INEC’s Spokesman, Rotimi Oyekanmi, said: “It is Result Viewing Portal which means that it is platform where election results are displayed by INEC.

“Results for the Anambra election have not started coming in. There’s no results yet so nothing is expected to be on the portal.

“The results are expected to be uploaded between 3:30 to 4pm later today because the election ends by 2pm and the INEC officials are not expected to count results until the last person on the queue votes.

“So, it is when the registered voters in each polling unit have finished voting and votes are counted that results will be uploaded to the portal. “

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