The Independent National Electoral Commission has further reaffirmed its readiness to deliver a free, fair and credible polls by assuring Nigerians that any Bimodal Voter Registration Systems snatched by political thugs on election day will be rendered useless through deactivation from the backend.
INEC Deputy Director of Information and Communications Technology, Lawrence Bayode, made this known on Wednesday while featuring on a national television programme monitored by our correspondent in Lagos.
Bayode said the deactivation of BVAS from backend will ensure that the accreditation and authentication of voters for the general elections are not manipulated by hoodlums if the devices are stolen.
“If a BVAS is snatched, we have a system in place that can deactivate that particular BVAS,” said Bayode.
“We deactivate it so that whoever snatches the device will not be able to do anything with the device because the device pushes the accreditation data automatically on its own even without the operator pushing a button. When it is idle, it pushes that accreditation data to the backend.”
Nigerian elections since the inception of the current democratic dispensation from 1999 have been characterised by ballot-box snatching, stuffing and violence at some polling units by hoodlums and political thugs hired by politicians for such evil jobs.
It would seem the electoral body understands this and has factored it in just to achieve its set goal of delivering a credible poll.
