Presidential polls: Declare election inconclusive now – POSN charges INEC

By Ihechukwu Sunday

The Peter Obi Support Network (POSN) has called on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to stop the ongoing collation of the presidential election results, and comply with the provisions of the Electoral Act, which stipulates that results must be uploaded and transmitted to the INEC Result Viewing Portal (IRev) before collation could take place.

A statement by the group’s Director of Information, Alhaji Ismaila Savu, condemned the electoral body for violating its own laws on transmission of results.

The group lamented that INEC had violated all the stipulated guidelines on transmission of results despite all the assurances to the public.

Part of the statement read: “Section 60 of the Electoral Act provides that the Presiding Officer shall, after counting the votes at the polling unit, enter the votes scored by each candidate in a form to be prescribed by the Commission as the case may be.

“Section 60(5) of the Act provides that the Presiding Officer shall transfer the results, including total number of accredited voters and the results of the ballot, in a manner as prescribed by the Commission.

“The Independent National Electoral Commission, thereafter, pursuant to Section 148 of the Electoral Act, 2022, may, subject to the provisions of this Act, issue regulations, guidelines, or manuals for the purpose of giving effect to the provisions of this Act and for its determination.

“This regulations and guidelines cover elections and arrangement for their conduct, accreditation and voting procedures at elections, and collation of election results.

“Article 38 of the electoral guidelines which provides for the electronic transmission of results and upload of results to IReV stated that on completion of voting and results, the presiding officer shall electronically transmit or transfer the result of the polling unit directly to the collation system as prescribed by the Commission.

“The presiding officer shall use the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) to upload a scanned copy of the EC8A to the IReV as prescribed by the Commission as well as take the BVAS and the original copy of each of the forms in tamper evident envelope to the Registration Area (RA)/Ward Collation Office, in the company of security agents. The polling agents may accompany the presiding officer to the RA/Ward Collation Centre.”

“The IReV is a platform created by INEC in Nigeria to provide real-time transmission of election results from polling units to the central collation centre. It was designed to enhance the transparency of the electoral process and reduce the incidence of vote rigging and election manipulation.

“The IReV platform allows voters and other interested parties to monitor the electoral process and view the results of the ongoing elections in real-time. The portal provides pictures of the election results from each polling unit, including the number of votes cast for each candidate and the percentage of total votes cast.”

The group lamented that most of the election conducted on February 25, spilled over to the early hours of February 26, 2023.

POSN decried the conduct of some polling agents who refused, failed and neglected to upload scanned copies of the EC8A to the IReV during the collation of the results, therefore did not electronically transmit the result of the polling units to the collection system.

“The polling officials mentioned several factors that stopped or inhibited the upload and transmission such as wrong password, no password, no network, device low battery and presidential IReV not working. When approached, INEC through its spokesperson, Festus Okoye insisted it was a mere glitch and that the IRev would be back in no time.

“To our greatest chagrin, the INEC chairman began to collate the results and started receiving results from the state returning officers without the results being transmitted or uploaded in the IReV. This is a violation of the extant laws that require all results to be uploaded and transmitted to IReV.

“We, therefore, request that the Commission should immediately halt the ongoing return exercise and announcement of results until the results are uploaded and transmitted to IRev,” the group submitted.