Some electorate in Kaura Local Government Area of Kaduna State have appealed for extension of voting time in areas with faulty voting machines in the ongoing LG poll.
The electorate made the appeal in separate interviews with the News Agency of Nigeria in Manchok on Saturday.
One of them, Benjamin Kazah, said the election was very peaceful, but decried the problem of voting machine malfunction, describing it as “a technical disenfranchisement”.
Kazah urged the Kaduna State Independence Electoral Commission to fix the problem and extend voting time in polling units where machines malfunctioned.
Another electorate, Aaron Bobai, told NAN that he was at his polling unit as early as 7am so that he would cast his vote around 8am when the election was supposed to commence.
The visibly frustrated Bobai said he waited up to 10am but voting did not commence.
He said: “We were told that the voting machine malfunctioned, so I went back home disappointed after wasting so much time.
“KADSIECOM should please fix the problem and extend our voting time to enable us exercise our franchise.”
NAN reports that voters turned out for the election as early as 7am, but could not exercise their franchise due to the malfunctioning of voting machines in more than 10 Polling Units in Kaura Local Government Area.
Checks revealed that voting machines in two polling Units in Manchok Ward, five in Bondon Ward, two in Zankan Ward and two others in Kaura Ward among others were not functioning.
While some of the machines had the problem of Authorisation Card, wrong Polling Unit Code, others had timing issues.
At Polling Unit 001, Unguwan Abba Dube 1, the Presiding Officer, Ayuba Mutum, told NAN that they could not commence election because the authorisation card was not meant for the machine.
In Polling Unit 015, Kaura Ward, the voting machine had timing problem, as such voting could not commence.
When contacted, Joseph Bako, the Local Government Electoral Officer, KADSIECOM, acknowledged the problem, adding that steps were being taken to address them.
“We are currently collating data of all voting machines that have issues and I am assuring you that we will fix them and election would continue,” Bako told NAN.
Linus Bako, the Information and Communication Technology Support Staff in the LGA, explained that the Authorisation Card for some of the machines were mistakenly swapped with other machines.
On the timing problem, Bako told NAN that the voting machines were programmed to begin operation by 8am to 8pm automatically, adding that unfortunately, some of the machines were displaying wrong time.
He said: “There is also the problem of polling Unit Code, which when wrongly inputted, the machine would not work.
“I have fixed the machine in polling 001 and voting had commenced around 1:30pm.”
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