Mock elections: 70% unverified as card readers malfunction

The All Progressives Congress, the Peoples Democratic Party and other political parties in Niger State have commended the Independent National Electoral Commission but lamented the slow process of the card readers used in the mock elections on Saturday.
They said the card readers drag beyond the stipulated time.
Speaking separately at Egwa-Gwada on Saturday at the Central Primary school, Egwa-Gwada Registration Area, Shiroro Local Government Area, the leaderships of the parties however commended INEC for the exercise, saying the good news about the card reader is that it vehemently rejects any card brought in from another polling units.
The Chairman of the PDP, Umar Musa Maali, said: “The time spent to accredit one voter is more.
“If it can take a minute per voter to be accredited and polling unit like this place that has over 1,000 voters, it is going to take over 1,000 minutes, which is about 16 hours, to accredit all the voters.
“You know 16 hours is more than the accreditation time of five hours.
“I do not know how INEC is going to handle this and improve on it.”
Maali however said the PDP is satisfied with the exercise except the time frame for accreditation, which is longer than the specified time.
Speaking also on his party’s concerns over the internet connection, the APC Publicity Secretary in the state, Comrade Jonathan Vatsa, said the service is very poor.
Vatsa, however, said the APC will ensure INEC’s attention is drawn to it so that all polling units are covered and captured.
The Chairman of the Social Democratic Party, Mohammed Alfa, faulted the absence of party agents.
Alfa said INEC should have involved the parties representatives to monitor the exercise.
He said: “As the card readers reads the card, it is supposed to transmit the voters’ data straight to the central unit for proper collation, but this unit lacks internet service and the agents would have known the number of voters who had failed verification.”
While addressing journalists, the INEC National Commissioner supervising Kaduna, Kwara and Niger States and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, Dr. Chris Iyimoga, said the process of demonstration to the public has been smooth except for few hitches with some card readers, which could be due to finger identification.
Iyimoga said: “We are trying to find out if it is the technique by the officer or handling of the card reader will pose a problem.
“In some instances, people clean their hands with methylated spirit, which has to do with the level of cleanliness of fingers, because as soon as the fingers are clean, you will be through.
“Then card is brought to Assistant Presiding Officer who confirms whether it is your card, and when the card is swiped, it says cleared, which then means it is your card and you are identified as an eligible voter whether the voters’ finger prints are verified or not.
“All the voter needs to do is to fill an ‘incident’ form that will allow him or her to vote.”
The card reader kept saying ‘Verification failed’ and over 70 per cent of eligible voters in Gwada Ward had failed verification, but were said to be eligible since the data in the Permanent Voter Cards corresponded with the official list and also as the machine identified them as owners of the PVCs.
Iyimoga also disclosed that if the information given by the electorates are correct, the voter will still be allowed to vote, adding that the Commission has backup to the card readers in case there are cases of malfunctioning.
The process started at 8:15am.
People turned out en masse, but most of them could not participate because they were not having their PVCs.
Gwada Ward has 22 polling units, with 22 card reader machines and two backup card readers.
The Eagle Online gathered that the card readers kept saying “verification failed” despite thorough cleansing of the fingers with spirit.
However, it was discovered that Anguwan Sani polling unit in Gwada Ward (011) has 963 voters, with only 15 PVCs, thereby leading to the rest being disenfranchised.
As at the time of filing this report at 1:10pm, the voters were still on the queue for accreditation.