From Romanus Ugwu, Abuja
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has admitted that it is experiencing a shortfall of over 6,154 ad-hoc staff in Imo State for the November 11 governorship election.
This was disclosed, yesterday, by its chairman, Mahmood Yakubu, at an ongoing two-day workshop on Bayelsa, Imo, Kogi states governorship elections for members of INEC Press Corps in Akwanga, Nasarawa State.
The INEC boss, however, said the commission would source the shortfall from neighbouring states. He also announced that the summary of the successful applicants showed that Bayelsa and Kogi have full complement of their requirement for all categories of the ad-hoc staff.
Represented by the National Commissioner and Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee, Sam Olumekun, Yakubu also raised a fresh security alarm ahead of the elections in the three states.
Although he assured that both the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) and INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV) used to upload the election results real-time would compulsorily be used for the elections, the Commission would still adopt the manual method to collate election results.
Decrying the spate of insecurity in the states, he urged political parties participating in the off-cycle governorship elections to critically study and pay attention to the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act, the Police Act, and the Public Order Act for the proper and peaceful conduct of political campaigns, rallies, and processions.
“A political campaign or slogan shall not be tainted with abusive language directly or indirectly likely to injure religious, ethnic, tribal, or sectional feelings. Abusive, intemperate, slanderous, or base languages or innuendoes designed or likely to provoke violent reactions or emotions shall not be employed or used in political campaigns. Let me also note that insecurity is still a concern in the states. We appeal to the stakeholders not to overheat the polity,” he appealed.
On the deployment of technology for the polls, he reiterated that “for the three governorship elections scheduled for November 11, the Commission will deploy the BVAS to authenticate the Permanent Voters’ Card (PVC), and upload polling unit results to the IREV seamlessly on election day.”
However, both the director of ICT and other resource persons warned: “It is important to note that this is not results collation system, as results collation will still be through manual process.”
POST AUTHOR: Rapheal
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