•Warns burning of its offices inimical to early preparation for 2023 polls •Diri: e-voting will ensure rancour-free polls Chuks Okocha in Abuja The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) …
•Diri: e-voting will ensure rancour-free pollsThe Independent National Electoral Commission has said its decision to embark on an online registration of voters next month does not guarantee an automatic transmission of election results.
The PDP had in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, noted that since INEC said it was now in a position to deploy technology to conduct online registration of voters, which included electronic transmission of voter’s data to its central server, the commission could also conduct an electronic transmission of results directly from the polling unit to its central server.
“The register of voters does not vote. Amendments to the law will focus on Electronic Voting and Transmission of Results. We are simply compiling, maintain and updating the register of voters”, Okoye stated. “Our Local Government Offices are indispensable in our preparations for elections. It is the Local Government Offices that carry out the conversion and relocation of polling units. The local government offices and the local government staff of the commission will be the prime movers of the Continuous Voters Registration. The local governments are the staging posts of the bulk of electoral activities.
On the planned Online Voter Registration, he said the commission was the only federal executive body empowered by the constitution to arrange and conduct the registration of persons qualified to vote and prepare, maintain and revise the register of voters for the purposes of any election under the Constitution.
On his part, Diri, who spoke during the inauguration of the new INC leadership at the Ijaw House in Yenagoa, urged the Independent National Electoral Commission to adopt electronic voting to avoid conflicts during elections.