INEC free to transmit Anambra governorship poll results electronically – Senate panel

Chairman Senate Committee on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Senator Kabiru Gaya on Wednesday said the electoral body is free to transmit the Anambra State governorship election result electronically if it so desires.

Gaya gave this hint while briefing reporters after the National Assembly Joint Committee on Electoral Matters and

INEC met with stakeholders on the November 6, 2021 governorship election in Anambra State.

Asked if INEC can transmit results of the election electronically, Gaya said: “It is left for INEC to decide whether it will transfer the election results in Anambra or not. They have done that in the previous elections in Edo and Ondo States.”

He added: “Even before the INEC started transferring elections results from polling units, Nigerians have been monitoring results of elections the moments they are being announced at polling stations and by 4pm, even before the final results are announced, many Nigerians would have seen them on the internet. Nigerians are fully involved in elections.”

Gaya said INEC assured the joint committee that it will go ahead with the Anambra election and declare the winner despite the prevailing security situation in the State.

“We expect the people of the state to cooperate fully with the electoral body by being law abiding.

“The only way to achieve free and fair, credible election in Anambra is for everybody to eschew violence,” Gaya added.

National Chairman of INEC, Professor Yakubu Mahmood, said the agency has recovered from the series of attacks by yet to be identified persons in Anambra state.

“We have recovered from the series of attacks on our facilities and I am happy to say that we have deployed all the non-sensitive materials to all the local government areas.

“We have trained the requisite number of ad hoc staff for the election and we have also mobilized members of the National Union of Road Transport Workers for efficient distribution of materials on Election Day. As far as INEC is concerned, we are good to go on November 6, 2021.”

On the level of distribution of Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) in Anambra State, he said: “We have a little over 81,000 valid registrants. After the suspension of the CVR (Continuous Voter Registration) in Anambra State, that includes a little over 5,000 that applied for replacement of cards and intra-state and inter-state transfers.

“As we speak we are batching the cards. They will leave first thing tomorrow morning for Awka and all the new registrants will get their cards before the elections.

“This time around with the help of technology we were able to harvest the telephone numbers and email addresses of the registrants.

“So we will contact each and every one of them and tell them where to pick their cards. But the cards will be delivered to Awka tomorrow.”

He added that INEC will make announcement in the media to ensure that those without telephones and emails to collect their cards at the ward level.