BY TIMOTHY AGBOR, OSOGBO
An accredited election observer group for the Osun State Governorship election, Centre for Transparency Advocacy (CTA), has disclosed that only 40 percent of the 1,518,303 voters in Osun came out to elect the next governor of the state on Saturday.
Addressing a press conference in Osogbo on preliminary observation of the group, the Executive Director of CTA, Faith Nwadishi, also commended the Independent National Electoral Commission for early commencement of the voting exercise saying “INEC is improving.”
Nwadishi said, “With over One million, five hundred and eighteen thousand, three hundred and three (1,518, 303) PVCs collected out of a total of One million, nine hundred and fifty five thousand, six hundred and fifty seven (1, 955,657) registered voters, the Osun Governorship election presented the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) with another opportunity to consolidate on the improvements made during the Ekiti State Gubernatorial election of 18th June 2022 and also show to the Nigerian people and indeed the entire world its readiness to conduct a credible, free and fair general election in 2023.
“The Centre for Transparency Advocacy (CTA) trained and deployed accredited 60 independent observers covering the entire 30 Local Government Areas of the state. This preliminary statement therefore represents our initial observations on the conduct of the election.
“Our field observers report indicated that polling officials arrived early in most of the polling units, with many of the polling units opening around 7.30am This is an indication of improvement with regards to election logistics arrangement on the part of INEC. We hope this improvement will be consolidated upon and carried into the 2023 general elections.
“Reports from our observers in the field indicated that voter accreditation and voting started on time in most of the polling units. While there were delays in a few polling units due to delay in commencement of briefing of the electorates on the procedure for the elections, our observers report indicated that over 95% of polling units opened on time.
“From field reports, with few exceptions, BVAS worked perfectly well in the Osun elections with voter accreditation taking between 1 to 3 minutes on the average. The few cases of issues with the BVAS were reported in Ifelodun, Olonde and Ikirun Ward 8 Unit 7 and Ede North, Ward 5 Unit 16 Alusekere. It is however, heartwarming to note that these cases were swiftly attended to by INEC officials. We also note that INEC made good its promise to deploy at least two BVAS machines in polling units where they have more than a thousand voters
“The CTA notes with satisfaction the performance of INEC officials during the election. In most of the polling units covered by our observers, polling officials exhibited professionalism and knowledge of their duties. The lapses identified in previous elections can be traced to the deployment of untrained ad hoc staff. We encourage INEC to ensure that only trained ad hoc staff are deployed for subsequent elections.
“As reported by our observers in the field, priority was given to the aged, the PWDs and the pregnant women as stipulated by INEC guidelines. There were separate queues for the aged, PWDs, the pregnant women and nursing mothers in most of the polling units our observers were deployed.
“Our observers’ report indicated that security agents generally arrived early at the polling units and were professional in their conducts especially in the maintenance of law and order. We further observed that there was synergy and networking among the various security agencies.
“From our observers’ report, voter turnout was generally reasonable, with report indicating that in some polling units the electorates were already out before 7am. We therefore commend the Osun state electorates for their enthusiastic turnout and orderly conduct. We envisage a voter turnout of about 40% in this election.
“Unfortunately, observers’ report indicated that the ugly trend of vote buying that is fast becoming a major feature of our democracy reared its ugly head during the Osun state Gubernatorial election. Our observers reported that vote buying, and selling were rife with the major parties deploying new vote buying schemes/tactics to evade security operatives. Nigerians, the INEC, the Security Agencies and other stakeholders need to work out measures to effectively address this ugly phenomenon. Political parties should be made to understand that encouraging vote buying is a criminal offence while the security agencies should make party officials liable for the vote buying activities of their agents
“The report from the field indicates that the voting process was generally peaceful except for view altercations is some polling units.
“Our observers reported the presence of officials of the Anti-Corruption Agencies in several polling units. Four officials of the PCC, EFCC and ICPC were sighted at polling units across the state.”
