Edo governorship election: INEC presents voters’ register to 14 political parties

The Independent National Electoral Commission on Monday presented soft copies of the voters register to 14 political parties participating in the September 19 governorship election in the state.

May Agbamuche-Mbu, the INEC National Commissioner in charge of Edo, Rivers and Bayelsa States, presented the register to the political parties at the INEC office located at Sapele Road in Benin, Edo State.

Agbamuche-Mbu said the presentation marked the flag off of the publication of the voters register in Edo State.

She said: “In pursuant to section 20 of the electoral Act 2010, as amended, the commission is mandated to publish the voters register for the conduct of a general election.

“Consequently, the register shall be published in a designated location in all the local government areas, registration areas and polling units in Edo.

“It is my profound appeal that you advice your constituents, members and voters on the need to check their details in the register.

“To know the location of their polling units and come out en masse to vote on September 19.

“You may recall that the commission publicly declared on January 7, 2019 that Nigeria has a total of 84,004 084 voters.

“And by virtue of that declaration, the total number of registered voters in Edo as at today is 2,210,534, with 1,159,325 male and 1,051,209 female.”

According to Agbamuche-Mbu, INEC as an electoral umpire has resolved to be professional, independent and impartial.

“Therefore, we expect that the political parties join INEC and the security agencies in conducting a truly violent-free election,” she stated.

She also explained that the commission had put in place a policy to conduct the election under strict adherence to the NCDC guidelines on COVID-19.

The Resident Electoral Commissioner, John Alalibo, in his remarks urged the political parties to always present themselves for INEC programmes when called upon.

Alalibo said: “INEC is doing well, especially as it relates to the new innovation introduced to improve our electoral process.

“All the information we give out here are all in accordance with the electoral law and it is important that we present it to you.

“I can see that 10 of the 14 political parties participating in the governorship election are here.

“The other four that are not here will have to come to my office to collect theirs.”

Earlier, Ama Agwu, the Deputy Director, Software and Training from INEC headquarters, Abuja, spoke on the new technological innovation to the electoral system.

Agwu said the new technologies introduced by the commission would help improve the electoral process to achieve credibility and transparency in elections.

He listed the new innovation introduced by INEC to include voter authentication system and Bi-modal voter authentication using the smart card readers and facial matching software.

According to him, the commission has also introduced the INEC results viewing portal (lRev) to improve the openness and credibility of elections.

Agwu further explained that the form EC8A filled and signed by presiding officers would be uploaded to the portal and could be viewed by the public.