FIJ
The charm of the February 25 election was the introduction of technology to the electoral process. The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) introduced the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) and the Result Viewing (IReV) portal, which, according to the commission, would promote transparency.
Following the success of the new tech innovations in the Ekiti and Osun State elections, the commission evoked the peoples’ trust and high expectations for a more transparent and inclusive electoral process.
This trust and expectations were, however, dashed, following record-high irregularities, voter suppression and disenfranchisement in a highly anticipated presidential election.
The presidential election has come and gone, but INEC continues to grapple with frayed integrity and citizen’s distrust after failing to demonstrate the transparency it claimed the new technologies would bring.
AN ONSLAUGHT AGAINST INEC?
On every side of the divide, the commission has met stiff criticism. On social media, young people have continued to trend hashtags like #Occupy INEC, #INECisCompromised and #INECObeyCourtOrder in efforts to demand accountability from the commission.
Peter Obi and Atiku Abubakar, presidential candidates of the Labour Party (LP) and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) respectively, with separate ex parte applications, asked to be allowed to inspect the electoral materials used in the conduct of the general election.
Following a protest led by its presidential candidate at the INEC headquarters in Abuja, the PDP has called for the resignation of Mahmood Yakubu, INEC chairman, for “subverting the will of Nigerians in the February 25, 2023 presidential and national assembly elections”.
HOW INEC THREW AWAY ITS LUCK
During the February 25 election and the post-election period, INEC fed Nigerians’ distrust in institutions with its lack of accountability and transparency.
By continuing a manual collation of election results while they were yet to be fully uploaded on its IReV portal, Yakubu and the commission carried out an assault on the trust of Nigerians.
FIJ recorded that over 19,000 results were still missing from the IReV portal, days after Yakubu announced Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the All Progressive Congress (APC) winner of the presidential election.
Worse, the commission failed to take responsibility for all of this. Instead, it appealed the ex parte application of Obi and Abubakar, requesting access to the BVAS.
