INEC to fix BVAS, other impediments before 2023 polls

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) said it will improve the functionality of Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) in the forthcoming by-elections and off-season governorship polls in Ekiti and Osun before the 2023 general election, as well as review election day administration.

Last weekend’s area council elections in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) was marred by dyfunctional BVAS; late arrival of staff/materials and unawareness of the newly created Polling Units which led to disenfranchisement of some voters.

Mahmood Yakubu, INEC chairman, at the first meeting of the year with the Resident Electoral Commissioners (RECs) in Abuja on Tuesday, said the Commission would ensure some of the challenges are tackled ahead of future elections.

Yakubu acknowledged the challenges to the optimal functionality of the BVAS in the FCT Area Council election and previous polls and assured that the Commission is working on them.

He said: “When the commission introduced the BVAS last year, the compact device was intended to achieve two objectives. First is the verification of the genuineness of the Permanent Voters’ Cards (PVCs) and the fingerprint or facial authentication of voters during accreditation.”

“Secondly, to replace the Z-pad for uploading the polling unit results to the INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV) in real-time on election day. So far, the BVAS has performed optimally in verifying the authenticity of PVCs and uploading images of Polling Unit results to the IReV.

“We will review and improve its functionality for biometric accreditation of voters in the forthcoming by-elections and off-season Governorship elections before the 2023 general election.”

Yakubu announced that INEC has devolved the Continuous Voter Registration (CVR) exercise to Ward level in both Ekiti and Osun to enable more citizens register ahead of the June and July governorship elections in the States.

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He also stated that the commission is considering the devolution of the exercise nationwide beyond its State and Local Government offices where the registration currently takes place to other designated centres, saying it was one of the major issues for discussion at the meeting with RECs.

“Closely related to the issue of CVR is the balanced distribution of voters to polling units nationwide. Last year, the Commission achieved the historic feat of expanding voter access to polling units nationwide.

“The idea is to decongest the densely populated polling units by converting the erstwhile Voting Points (VPs) and Voting Point Settlements (VPS) to Polling Units and relocating some of them to unserved and underserved areas to make it easier for voters on election day.”

“While this lofty goal has been achieved in many states, there are still congested Polling Units and other Polling Units with between 0 and 50 voters as we saw in some of the recent elections. Over the next few weeks, the Commission will intensify efforts to address the issue ahead of the forthcoming Ekiti and Osun Governorship elections and ultimately the 2023 General Election. Finding a solution to this issue is one of the reasons for convening this meeting, Yakubu added.