The meeting would also review the commission’s readiness for the March 28 and April 11 general elections.
An INEC commissioner, who confided in one
of our correspondents, said, “The commission has been
impressed by the
testing of card readers. We are so happy that Nigerians are appreciating
our efforts.
“Nothing can stop us from using the card readers, which we believe will eliminate fraud during the elections.”
Idowu, had earlier on Monday confirmed that INEC had
started “compiling reports” from its field officers, including the RECs,
on the mock test of the card readers in 12 states.
The states are Rivers, Ebonyi , Ekiti, Taraba , Kebbi, Nasarawa, Niger, Lagos, Delta, Bauchi, Anambra and Kano.
Idowu added that a statement would be issued by the commission once the results were compiled.
He said, “The commission is compiling
reports from the field officers, including the RECs. The commission will
look at the reports and make its findings known.
“While we are waiting for this, we must
also say that the reports we have received from the media and Nigerians
showed that the exercise was a success.”
The two main political parties in the
country – the Peoples Democratic Party and the All Progressives Congress
– have different opinions on the outcome of the card reader test.
While the PDP expressed concern over what
it called a series of complaints by Nigerians regarding the exercise,
the APC said it was satisfied.
On complaints by some people that the
battery of some of the card readers did not work optimally during the
test on Saturday, Idowu said that was not true.
“At the end of the exercise in most places, the batteries still had 60 per cent power unused in them,” he added.
Idowu also reaffirmed that INEC, would
deploy 152,031 card readers for the elections that would take place in
119,973 polling booths across the country.
According to him, some polling booths with more than 4,000 registered voters had been broken into units within the same centre.
He said, “We have 119,973 polling booths
across the country. However, there are some polling booths which have
more than 4,000 voters. These ones have been broken into units within
the same booth. The only difference is that all the voters won’t be in
the same queue.
“We won’t have more than 700 voters in a
voting unit or polling booth, but all the voters in a particular polling
unit or booth will still vote in the same place, but will not be on the
same line.”
He further explained that the number of
polling booths and units in each state would determine the number of
card readers to be deployed in them.
But a group, PDP Integrity Vanguard, on
Monday warned that the card readers must be jettisoned because they
could give an undue advantage to the APC.
The PDP IV, at a news conference
addressed by Anietie Okon and Sergeant Awuse, said, “The card readers
are unarguably a recipe for monumental national disaster and must be
discarded at this point because of the obvious intention to use them to
rig elections in favour of APC and the consequent attendant threat to
peace and security of the people of this country.
“In what is a classical case of putting
the cart before the horse, the National Assembly was deliberately
hoodwinked into approving the use of the card readers days before the
test-run that has thrown up inherent weaknesses of the machine.”
It also raised the alarm that INEC was “creating additional 30,000 voting points” despite National Assembly’s opposition.
Stressing that the introduction of “new
voting points” and “incident form” was unacceptable, the group called
on the National Assembly to, “ as a matter of urgent national
importance, investigate the introduction by INEC of the so-called voting
points.”
The group said, “INEC’s action is
obviously intended to surreptitiously circumvent National Assembly’s
express position on the matter.
“We believe it is the clandestine way
Prof. Attahiru Jega(INEC chairman) hopes to achieve his original
intention of using them to generate the tie-breaking bank of votes and
must not be allowed.”
Meanwhile, the Oyo State REC , Rufus Akeju, has stated that 5,620 card readers would be used in the state for the elections.
Akeju, in an interview with one of our
correspondents in Ibadan, said, “We have received 6,000 card reading
machines already from Abuja. We expect that more machines could be sent
if there is a need for them.
“We actually need 5,620 machines but the
extra machines are there in case any of them malfunctions during the
election process. We do not want any delay during the accreditation
process; that is why we have requested more of the machines.”
The REC, who was in Ekiti State on
Saturday for the mock test of the card readers, said contrary to
criticisms, the device would not delay the accreditation of voters.
“The machine has 14 hour-lifespan. We did not use up to 20 per cent of the battery of any of them during the test-run.”
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