FCT Elections: We’ll Monitor Your Campaigns, INEC Warns Parties

Just about 25 days to the Area Council elections in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has warned political parties to conduct their campaigns in line with the law.

The chairman of the Commission, Professor Mahmoud Yakubu, at a quarterly meeting with stakeholders today, January 18 in Abuja , said that in

the next few weeks, the Commission will intensify stakeholder engagements.

He said that the Commission will also engage in “the monitoring of campaigns by political parties and preparations for Election Day activities.”

According to Professor Yakubu, major

activities have already been carried out, including the conduct of primaries and nomination of candidates by political parties.

“Only last week, the Commission presented the register of voters to political parties while the PVCs for new registrants, requests for transfers and replacement of cards have been printed and delivered several weeks ago to our FCT office for collection by voters.

“On this note, I want to draw your attention to the distribution of voters to Polling Units in the FCT, particularly the fact that 593 out of 2,822 or 21% of the total, do not have voters.

“This is because voters failed to take advantage of the expansion of access to transfer to these new Polling Units. The detailed distribution of voters to Polling Units in the FCT is among the documents in your folders for this meeting.”

The INEC boss said that the Commission will use the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) in the FCT elections which is the second major election after the Anambra Governorship election held in November last year.

“The 68 constituencies in the FCT (six Chairmen and 62 Councillors) covering extensive urban and rural locations sharing border with five States in the North Central and North Western parts of the country is another opportunity to pilot the efficacy of the BVAS in a different geographical, geo-political and electoral context.

“The same technology will be deployed in all forthcoming bye-elections across the country.”

He said for all elections going forward, Polling Unit results will be uploaded in real-time to the INEC Result Viewing (IReV) portal.