By Jude Opara, Abuja

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) yesterday broke its silence over the claims in certain quarters that it collected huge sums of money from internal development partners for the conduct of the 2023 general elections.

INEC Chairman, Prof.

Yakubu further explained that all the intervention of the development partners were done in support of CSOs and implementing the functions of the partners in the field.

“However, it is necessary to seize this opportunity to correct the impression in some sections of the public that the Commission received huge sums of money from development partners for the election.

“Indeed, it has been a longstanding policy of the present Commission not to receive direct funding and cash transfers from sources other than the Federal Government of Nigeria. We hope that we shall continue to have this type of productive partnership with civil society and development partners in the future.

“It is in furtherance of this partnership that the Commission accredits observers because the feedback we receive, and their actionable recommendations have been very helpful to the electoral process. For the 2023 General Election, the Commission received 538 requests (504 domestic and 34 foreign) for accreditation as observers. After a thorough evaluation of the requests, only 228 groups (190 domestic and 38 foreign) met the requirements for accreditation.”

However, the INEC boss regretted that so far, only 67 observer groups (62 domestic and five foreign) have submitted their observation reports, representing just about 30% of the accredited groups for the election.

He noted that since the 2019 General Election, has worked together with the National Assembly, CSOs and other stakeholders for the improvement of the electoral process.

“We were meticulous in our preparations for the election and there have been many positive developments in this regard. One area is the repeal and re-enactment of the Electoral Act 2010 into the Electoral Act 2022. The new law provides a period of 180 days for political parties to conclude their primaries and submit the names of candidates and the political parties took advantage of it for the 2023 General Election. This enabled the Commission to commence the process of producing the sensitive materials for the election in good time. I am glad to report that the printing of all sensitive and non-sensitive materials for the 2023 General Election was entirely done in Nigeria.

“This is the first time in 44 years since the transition to democratic rule in 1979 that this great step was taken and achieved, in spite of the record number of 93.4 million registered voters and over five hundred million ballot papers, result sheets and other documents for the five categories of the main elections and supplementary polls. For this reason, the 2023 General Election was held as scheduled for the first time in the last four electoral cycles without a postponement arising from the non-arrival of materials.

“Furthermore, we were also able to expand voter access to polling units for the first time since the initial delimitation exercise in 1996. Similarly, we introduced many technology-based innovations, including the physical registration and online pre-registration of voters using the INEC Voter Enrollment Device (IVED, the various portals for the nomination of candidates, party agents and the accreditation of observers and the media”.

Nevertheless, Yakubu said his Commission encountered many challenges before and during the elections.

“The severe cash and fuel situations were compounded by the perennial insecurity nationwide. Their impact on our deployment plans, compounded by the behaviour of some of our own officials in the field, made logistics management particularly challenging. The deployment of thugs by some political actors made election day administration difficult in a number of places.

“While voter accreditation using the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) was very successful, the uploading of results to the INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV), especially for the presidential election, encountered a glitch as explained in our statement released by the Commission on 26th February 2023. The Commission is aware that this matter is currently the subject of litigation and would reserve its comments for now”.

The INEC Chairman also assured that in addition to the review of the last general election, the Commission would like to share with the CSOs its plans for the upcoming bye-elections and preparations for the off-cycle Governorship elections in Bayelsa, Imo and Kogi States scheduled for Saturday 11th November 2023.