Attahiru urges NASS to remove legal encumbrances for possible electronic voting

KEHINDE AKINPELU, ILORIN.

A call has gone to the National Assembly to remove the legal
encumbrance for electronic voting and make it possible to boost electioneering process in the country.

Former chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission
(INEC), Prof Attahiru Jega, made the call in Ilorin, Kwara state,in a
lecture organised by Kwara Visioners Network for Rural Development.

He described the constitutional provision that prohibits the use of technology is a militating factor against electronic voting in Nigeria.

The Professor of Political Science, blamed the National Assembling for opposing the use of electronic transmission of results, arguing that the method was cost-effective and easier to deploy.

The former INEC boss, whose lecture dwelt on: ‘Politics, governance and leadership recruitment in 21st century democracy,’noted that: “The National Assembly, after 2019 elections, promised to
review the electoral legal framework which will to improve the
integrity of the electoral commission.

“The most important issue that can add value to the integrity of
elections they are jettisoning is that because of self-serving interest.

“We have upscaled the integrity of the Nigerian electoral commission
with incremental use of technology.

“Now we have got to a point where the pilot scheme that has been done
in INEC since 2012 of using electronic transmission of results INEC in itself said it can rarely use it in the 2023 elections. In fact, INEC has used it in some elections in parts of the country.

“It is a pilot sbcheme which all the stakeholders have been observing and said it is
good.

“The next thing is to remove the major hindrance in the use of
technology, because there is a constitutional provision which says
that electronic voting is prohibited.

“Many Nigerians who are in support of electronic voting are blaming
INEC for saying it cannot use electronic voting.

“They have forgot that
there is a legal provision that says electronic voting is prohibited.

“Now people are hoping that the National Assembly will remove that
encumbrance, not necessarily for INEC to plunge into electronic voting
in 2023 but for it to identify the best electronic voting system for
the country.

“People are also saying that electronic transmission of results is
easier to deploy.

“It is most cost-effective compared with the use of electronic voting.
So why not begin with the electronic transmission of results. On the
one hand the lawmakers said that INEC is permitted to do electronic
voting provided it does not do electronic transmission of results.

Infact, what they are saying is that they are not allowing INEC to do
electronic voting because they do not want electronic transmission of
results.

“Unfortunately, the National Assembly is opposed to the use of
electronic transmission of results.
“From my personal experience in
INEC, one of the major ways in which the integrity of the electoral
process is undermined is in the manual transmission of results from
the polling units to ward, local and constituency levels.”

“If the electoral commission is impartial and tries hard to improve the integrity of the electoral process, if the dominant actors (political parties and candidates) lack integrity and want to win by either hook or crook, they will be undermining the integrity of the electoral commission.

That is what we have seen. We
cannot compare the elections of 2011, 2015 and even 2019 with 2007.

“We have gone some ways in lifting the bar, but a lot needs to be done to improve the integrity of the electoral process.”

In his contribution,Mr Babajide Kolade-Otitoju, a Journalist said that the controversy surrounding the use of electronic voting “is meant to ensure the people can not freely choose their own leaders

He added that, “if the
fidelity of our elections is guaranteed, the people will be able to choose the best for them.

“Where politicians feel comfortable to rig elections and willfully take away the independence of INEC, our
national electoral body, they would not feel that they are responsible
to the people. There’s nothing so bad for the people than
to realise that their votes do not count or that politicians can win
elections in spite of the voter.”