Khadijat Saidu, Birnin Kebbi
In an effort to decongest the existing poling units, and make voting experience more pleasant and less tidious for the Peoples, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) is set to expand polling units in Kebbi state.
The Resident Electoral Commissioner, Alhaji Ahmed Bello Mahamud stated this at a meeting with electoral and assistant electoral officers at the INEC headquarters in Birnin Kebbi.
He said “consultation and building of national consensus around the expansion of access to polling units and the movement of voting points to un-served and underserved areas as stand-alone polling units are currently going on.
Mahamud said the aim is to decongest existing polling units, degrade overcrowding, increase voter turnout during election and improve the quality of legal services rendered by the commission.
Adding that in the next few days, the commission will conclude the consultative phase and release clear guidelines for the movement of voting points to decongest the existing ones.
Mahmud also stated that no voting point would be moved from one local government to another, adding that the expansion of polling units would not confer any advantage to any state of the federation.
He announced that all Nigerians eligible for registration should be assured that the commission will resume the continuous voter’s registration exercise as soon as the expansion of access to polling units is completed,’’ adding that the continuous voter registration using an improved enrolment device is a top priority for the commission.
According to him, all polling units will have a lower threshold of 750 voters and an upper threshold of 1,000.
The INEC commissioner also announced the plans of the commission to robustly ramp up it’s use of technology in the electoral process, this he said will include the introduction of electronic voting machines, and these voting machines will be deployed to all polling units and will be aligned to the existing device and means that will raise the integrity and transparency of the electoral process. He added that plans to achieve this had reached an advance stage.
