From Noah Ebije, Kaduna
Ahead of the 2023 general elections, the Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), Kaduna State, of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Dr. Mahuda Isah has noted that thuggery, fake news and other negative tendencies have been identified as threats to the election if proactive measures are not taken.
To this end, Dr. Isah called on stakeholders to ensure that they prevent any electoral violence in the forthcoming elections.
The REC spoke on Thursday during an interactive session with stakeholders in Kaduna.
He informed that all eligible and valid registrants can collect their PVCs from 9:00am to 3:00pm daily, including Saturdays and Sundays.
He said INEC Kaduna office is ready to commence distribution of PVCs, adding that, over 8000 BVAS machines have been received.
“Thuggery, vote buying, drug abuse, fake news are weapons of mass destruction for both election process and democracy, they are threat to peace and interest, and capable of sabotaging the credibility of entire election, therefore, stakeholders must join hands with INEC to these issues that are inimical to the success of every elections.
“As major stakeholders in the business of elections, I wish to urge you all that this meeting will increase our capacity and skills to come up with modalities of preventing and or mitigating the escalation of any electoral violence and conflict in the forthcoming 2023 general elections.
“Let me assure you of the Commission’s readiness to conduct a free, fair, credible, inclusive and acceptable elections in 2023.
“With the use of the BVAS, coupled with amendments in the Electoral Act 2022, I haven’t the slightest doubt that the 2023 general elections will be a huge success. But this is achievable only with your collective cooperation”.
On enlightenment, the INEC commissioner maintained that “we have been in the media for quite a while undertaking Jingles in local languages, interviews/programs by senior staff of the state office of the commission, vehicles are also being deployed, traversing all the nooks and crannies of the state for enlightening the public on the activities of the commission”
On election materials, he said, both sensitive and non-sensitive materials have so far been received, including p over 8000 BVAS Machines, Voting Cubicles and Ballot Boxes according to the number of Polling Units (PUs).
