INEC, political parties to collaborate on addressing voter apathy

By ANGELA ATABO

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) has said that it would collaborate with political parties to address the challenge of voter apathy, especially in urban areas, during elections.

The INEC Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) FCT, Yahaya Bello, stated this on Friday, in Abuja, at the presentation of certificates of return to successful candidates in the just concluded FCT Area Council elections.

Bello said that there was voter apathy in urban centres during the elections and some polling units were not utilised for voting.

He called on political parties to join INEC in providing voter education to address the challenge.

“We always maintain this, during the first republic, the political parties were up and doing in mobilising their supporters to do a lot of things.

“At that time, they were paying to fund the party, people were in politics not because they wanted to make money but they wanted to have political education and political self-sufficiency.

“Now, with this age that we are in, political parties are supposed to partner with INEC and other CSOs in order to mobilise their people to entrench in them the issue of political education and participation.

“Nobody will do this more than the political parties, when we found that there were difficulties for people to travel to so many places and also congested areas in our political voting desk,” the INEC boss said.

Bello said that the commission created additional polling units nationwide to give voters the opportunity to transfer to some of the new polling units to decongest the existing ones.

He said that unfortunately, voters did not take advantage of this opportunity as INEC had expected in all cases.

“We went and created polling units and then about 593 were zero during this elections.

“Unfortunately, if you look at the statistics of these zero polling units in the FCT, it was in the urban FCT, that is, in AMAC, in Gwarimpa, and other places.

“When you go to Kuje, for example, there were only three zero polling units and people had occupied these places,” he said.

Bello, however, said that the commission would look at these issues during its post-election meetings, in order to see what happened and what could be done to improve.

“We are going to sit down and see how we can make sure that in 2023, which is almost like tomorrow, there will be no zero polling units.

“Political parties will have to partner with us, NOA and other CSOs in order to ensure that these polling units are decongested,” the INEC Commissioner added.

According to him, this was a primary responsibility of political parties, mobilising their people in order for them to vote safely in these places.

The Minister of FCT, Mohammed Bello, represented by Dr Ramatu Aliyu, Minister of State for the FCT, congratulated the winners of the election and urged them to carry everyone along.

“Today is a remarkable day in the history of the FCT, having conducted one of the most credible and peaceful elections in the history of the third tier of government.

“Today’s event is for the presentation of certificates of return to the newly elected chairmen of the six area councils and, by extension, the 62 wards for councillors.

“The FCT administration does not in any way interfere with the conduct of elections, that in every way depicts transparency,” the minister said.

The minister, however, said that in the course of monitoring the election process in the six area councils, some observations were noted, including the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) being very slow and some people were disenfranchised.

He, therefore, called on INEC to consider providing an alternative for people to vote in the event of malfunctioning BVAS in subsequent elections.

INEC National Commissioner, Prof. Abdu Zuru, commended all stakeholders for their efforts in making the FCT election a success.

“We wish to thank and commend the security agents for their professional conduct before, during and after the elections, and for securing the environment to make the election possible.

“We also thank the actors, the political parties, their candidates and agents for generally conducting themselves peacefully before, during and after the elections,” he said.

Zuru also commended the media, as well as local and international observers for their efforts during the election.

Mr Sulieman Sabo, Chairman-elect Kuje Area Council, said that his objective was to serve the people, adding that he would consolidate on his past achievements to do that.

“We hope to double our efforts so that we leave Kuje area council, like I have always said, “better than we met it,” he said.

Sabo said that the door was open for those who contested with him but lost the election, to join hands with him to make Kuje area council a great place. (NAN)