WRITTEN BY SIR DENNIS EKEMEZIE
Tomorrow, Nigerians will go to polls to elect their leaders in the rescheduled Presidential and National Assembly elections. Despite the hiccup associated with postponement of the poll, there are indications that various institutions charged with ensuring successful conduct of the elections, are putting finishing touches to achieve success in the elections.
So far, the Chairman, Independent National Electoral Commission, Professor Yakubu Mauood, has continued to assure the Nation that his organization would conduct elections the world would be proud of. Security agencies have equally promised to secure the environment, protect lives and property during and after the elections. Thus, the electorate should feel free to undertake their electoral duties responsibly without undue fear of threat to their lives and property.
Accreditation process shall consist of authentication and verification of voters, using the Smart-Card Reader, checking of the Register of Voters, inking of the cuticle of the specified finger. Ballot paper shall be issued in the prescribed manner by the Presiding Officer at the Polling Unit. Accreditation and voting shall commence at 8am and close at 2pm, provided that any voter already on the queue should be granted access to accreditation and voting. The Presiding Officer, as the overseer, shall explain the voting procedure to the voters.
The voter must be a Nigerian citizen, and should be up to18 years old, registered in the ward and constituency he or she intends to vote. He or she must possess a Permanent Voter’s card-PVC. Those whose names are not in the voters’ register are not allowed to vote, and are not expected to be in the polling centers to avoid contravening the electoral law, which will lead to arrest.
Expectedly, the voter should be present at the polling centre early enough to avoid possible cut up by restriction of vehicular movement and should present himself or herself to the Presiding Officer who is to collect his or her PVC, cross check his or her name in the Voters’ Register, verify and authenticate voter’s name by using the Smart Card Reader. After checking the Register of voters, the officer will ink the cuticle of the specified finger. Voting will be by open secret Ballot system, meaning that one’s vote is secret as no one will see which candidate one has voted for. A voter is expected to move behind polling cubicle secretly, and apply any of his finger prints in the space which corresponds to the party name and symbol of one’s choice.
The marking of the ballot by the voter should be done in secret, while the depositing of the rolled ballot paper into the ballot box provided would be in the open view of all persons present.
Importantly, only one voter at a time will be allowed in the voting cubicle to ensure that secret voting is maintained as prescribed by law. Invariably, admission of intending voters into the line stops at 2pm, while intending voters already in the queue before 2pm are to be accredited and allowed to vote accordingly.
When all voters who queued before 2pm have voted, the Presiding Officer would empty the ballot box and display ballot papers before security personnel present and agents representing contesting political parties. Ballot papers would be sorted out, counted before political party and security agents.
Presiding Officer is expected to document the score of each contesting political party. After sorting of ballot papers, counting of scores, documentation of scores, Presiding Officer would announce the scores of each political party. The Presiding Officer (PO) is obliged by law to issue copies of announced poll results to party agents of the political parties and security personnel present.
The law mandates the Presiding Officer to paste on the wall, copies of poll results issued to party agents and security personnel. The Presiding Officer thereafter, in company of Security Agents, moves to deliver the poll results for collation and later transmission to Local Government Collation officials, who after collation, will transmit same to the state collation centre.
Truly, the procedure for the conduct of the elections is simple but demanding. It is therefore expected that all hands must be on deck to ensure free, fair and credible elections in 2019. Wishing Nigerians violence-free elections.
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