Nigeria:Jega Announces Procedures For Voting Release Of Results

Prof. Jega,The Chairman of INEC

 the Independent  National Electoral  Commission (INEC), Prof. Attahiru Jega,  released the processes and procedures for the  elections as well as the  processes  of releasing the results during the polls by the presiding officers.

Speaking  at a  stakeholder’ summit with political parties, that accreditation of voters would  take place from 8am till the last person to join the  queue at 1p.m. is accredited, while voting would  commence at 1.30pm and  would end when  the last  person on the queue has voted.

The INEC Chairman  further  said only persons with the permanent voters’ cards (PVCs) would be accredited, stating that the card readers would be used during the accreditation process.

He  said each political party is entitled to an agent at the polling station and that the agent must be  properly accredited in accordance with the regulations and guidelines.

According to Jega, “On March 28, three ballot boxes will be used in each of the  polling/voting points. Ballot boxes with  red cover is  for  putting a thumb printing ballot paper by a voter for  the presidential  election, ballot box with a black cover is putting thumb printing ballot paper by a voter for the senatorial election and the green ballot box is for putting thumb printed ballot paper  by a voter for the House of Representative.

“Each ballot  paper has  corresponding colour stripes  to  assist voters in putting the right ballot paper in the right ballot box. For each polling/voting point, there is a designated  official called overseer, whose primary job is to  ensure that voters put the right ballot paper into the right ballot box. Political parties need to  factor this  into their  campaigns to  minimize putting the ballot paper into the wrong ballot box”.

As a result of this, he said there  shall be two sorting of voting at  the polling units, explaining  that  it was  meant  to ensure that any  wrong placed ballot papers removed  and  put back  into the  right ballot boxes and the  second  is meant to determine the votes  cast by voters for a political party/candidate.

According  to the INEC chairman, “At the end of the  sorting and  counting of the  ballot  papers, the  results are  to be  announced to the  hearing of all and  a result poster is to be completed and posted at the  polling units. Copies of the results  sheets are to  be given a accredited  party agents who are present while the original is to conveyed  to the ward level coalition centre by the presiding  officer accompanied by the  security agents and the party  agents.

“At the ward level collation centre, if  there are complaints  and/or evidence of alteration of accreditation  figures on the result sheets, the information on  accreditation saved on the card readers used would be used by the collation officer to decide on the case”.

Jega  further explained that hard copies of  result sheet  from the polling units would be scanned, converted to PDF format and put in a database, will  be made accessible for viewing and  download via the INEC website. This, he said, is to  ensure the accuracy of the collated results.

He  also used the occasion to assure Nigerians of a credible, fair and transparent election at all levels.