Election: Group faults INEC in Imo, Rivers

YIAGA Africa on Wednesday announced that the Independent National Electoral Commis­sion’s (INEC) announcement of the presidential election. Especially in Rivers and Imo states is in sharp contrast with its own record ob­served from the polls.

YIAGA’s observations in the Election

“The state level presidential results for Imo and Rivers states are inconsistent with the YIAGA Africa Watching The Votes pro­jections for both states.

“For Rivers, INEC an­nounced 231,591 votes for APC on 44.2 percent; 175, 071 votes for the Labour Party (33.4 percent), and 88,468 for the Peoples Demo­cratic Party (PDP) representing 16.9 percent.

“This is in sharp contrast to the YIAGA Africa estimate for Rivers which are: APC, 21. 7% plus minus 5 percent, for the Labour Party, 50.8 percent plus minus 10.6, PDP, 22.2 percent plus minus 6 percent,” member of the YIAGA’s board, Dr. Aisha Abdulahi, revealed during their post-election statement on the 2023 presidential election.

The press conference was at­tended by officials of the United Nations, European Union and civil society groups.

Speaking further, Aisha said YIAGA’s observers obtained their data through random sampling of several polling units totalling over 1,500 polling units.

Further comments

For Imo State, Aisha disclosed that though INEC announced 66,406 votes for APC or 14.2%, 360,495 for LP or 77.1% and 30,234 for PDP or 6.5%, its esti­mate from the state puts APC at 5.1 percent plus or minus 2.3 percent, LP at 88.1 percent (plus or minus 3.8 percent) while PDP had 5.7 percent (plus or minus 2.3 percent).

YIAGA maintained that there were alleged inconsistencies from the presidential election results, particularly from Rivers and Imo states.

According to the research group, it found 8 instances (0.5 percent of polling units) of irreg­ularities in voter turnout where turnout was allegedly over 100%.

It also advised that INEC should probe results from states where announcements were made under duress.

“YIAGA Africa notes that these polling units may have been cancelled at the point of collation. YIAGA Africa urges INEC to publish a list of all can­celled polling units,” she said.

In its preliminary recommen­dations on Wednesday, Yiaga called for a comprehensive audit and investigation. To unravel the factors resulting in the delayed upload of election results on INEC’s online portal, saying it is “critical”.

She added that anyone found complicit in sabotaging this “crit­ical aspect of the election should be sanctioned.” Describing the electoral umpire’s failure to im­mediately upload results from polling units as a “flagrant dis­regard” of its guidelines.

YIAGA insisted that INEC has to clarify the inconsistencies in some of the results. Especially the presidential election results from Rivers and Imo states.

They also recommended that voting hours should be extended to 5p.m to increase voter partici­pation in subsequent elections.