A non-profit civic advocacy for the promotion of democratic governance, Yiaga Africa, has said that the current economic hardship and the challenges encountered during the mock accreditation on the Bi-Modal Voters Accreditation System (BVAS) as well as vote buying may distort the credibility of the February 25 presidential poll.
Yiaga Africa made this known in a Pre-election press release shared with newsmen on Friday ahead of the 2023 elections.
It said, “Although turnout for the process was low, we commend the Independent National Electoral Commission for conducting a mock accreditation to test the functionality of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS). The commission should urgently address the challenges witnessed during the mock accreditation to ensure the BVAS device functions optimally across the country on election day.
“All through the pre-election period, security challenges persisted across several locations. Beyond insurgency, banditry and kidnapping, the prevailing security situation leading to the 2023 Presidential election has been exacerbated by the tense political atmosphere.
“The current Naira redesign policy aimed at eliminating vote buying on election has resulted in a shortage of cash making it difficult for citizens to meet basic domestic needs. Yiaga Africa is concerned the negative impact of the policy may encourage voters to sell their votes in exchange for the scarce Naira notes. While the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) might have executed the deployment of nonsensitive materials across the 774 Local Government Areas (LGAs) and the training of election officials, the umpire is still faced with a myriad of challenges even as the exercise is hours away. According to Yiaga Africa, eligible voters who were unable to collect their Permanent Voters Cards (PVCs) and the relocation of voters to new polling units might be disenfranchised ahead of Saturday’s poll.
It said, “It Yiaga Africa notes that the litany of complaints about uncollected PVCs largely due to the unavailability of the cards are worrisome. Yiaga Africa is concerned that a good number of eligible voters may be disenfranchised for no fault of theirs. In addition, the delay in releasing the final figure of collected PVCs is per polling unit nationwide. The data on PVCs collected per polling unit is important in determining the conclusiveness of the election as INEC expects to use the data in the application of the margin of lead principle.
“The mock accreditation revealed that, in an attempt by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to decongest some of its oversized polling units, the commission relocated voters to new polling units. However, voters approached their polling units for mock accreditation before realizing they have been relocated to new polling units. While we commend the commission’s recent efforts by providing information on how voters can identify their polling units, we are concerned that some affected voters may not identify their voting locations on or before election day. Yiaga Africa will constitute panic, agitations and potential disenfranchisement on election day.
“Barely 48 hours to the Presidential elections, Nigerians are experiencing untold economic hardship caused by the recent scarcity of new naira notes and unending fuel scarcity. This has led to a series of protests in different parts of the country. This growing discontent amongst citizens may lead to voter apathy in the form of “protest” which will eventually lead to low voter turnouts. We are also worried that citizens facing these forms of adversities going into the election may be unable to make informed choices at the polls,” Yiaga Africa added.
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