Off-season polls: INEC pledges to upload results on IReV, Imo CP redeployed

Six days to the November 11 off-cycle governorship elections in Kogi, Bayelsa and Imo States, the Independent National Electoral Commission, yesterday assured that polling units’ results would be uploaded in real-time on the INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV).

INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, gave the assurance on Channels Television’s and Kimpact Development Initiative joint People’s Townhall on Election Security.

Yakubu, represented by the commission’s Acting Director, Voter Education and Publicity, Mary Nkem, said all the glitches experienced during the general elections earlier in the year had been taken care of.

He said the INEC had put lots of plans in place to guarantee early deployment of sensitive materials to polling units including ad hoc officers camping near polling units a day before the exercise.

He said sensitive materials would be moved from the Central Bank of Nigeria’s vaults to Kogi, Bayesla and Imo by Monday.

Asked whether the challenges with the IReV in the February 2023 presidential election had been identified and resolved, he said, “Sure, we had a post-election review and all of these thing that went wrong were identified.

He urged all political parties with candidates in the coming elections to have records of results of all the polling units to monitor collation.

Also speaking, the national chairman of the All Progressives Congress, Abdullahi Ganduje, called for a regular town hall, to deepen democracy.

Meanwhile, the Inspector-General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, announced the redeployment of the Imo State Commissioner of Police, Stephen Olanrewaju.

The organised labour had accused Olanrewaju of complicity in the recent attack on NLC President, Joe Ajaero, in Owerri, the Imo State capital.

“I am aware that there have been allegations on social media against the Commissioner of Police in Imo State but for this election, we’re changing the commissioner of police in Imo,” Egbetokun said.