As one of the means of ensuring firmer and more credible election results, the Federal Government will soon implement a rule that all non-electoral officers are excluded from ballot counting. The move is said to be part of government’s cost-saving agenda taking into consideration resources incurred in conducting re-run elections after court annulments.
There are at least 20 National Assembly elections that have been upturned at the tribunals which are billed for reruns in the first quarter of the year. There are also indications that INEC may spend not less than N40billion to conduct polls, at a conservative budget of about N2billion per election. A Presidency source yesterday told Daily Sun that the directive would soon be made public, compelling the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to implement the rule that voters, especially government officials, leave polling units after casting their ballot.
The directive is specifically targeted at ensuring that election results are not manipulated by intrested parties, reason most times the outcome or announced results of elections are at variance with the voters’ pattern of voting.
The new instruction could be implemented at the re-run National Assembly elections scheduled to hold between January and the end of March.
“The government is embarrassed by the number of elections voided by tribunals and appellate courts. They don’t reflect a good image for the electoral process in the nation. Government is ready to introduce measures to bring a change for cleaner and more credible elections,” the source said. It was also gathered that those to be excluded from counting of ballots after voting would include council chairmen, either elected or appointed, other government appointees, especially at the state level, including commissioners, special advisers, Secretary to State Governments and many others.
“The Electoral Act has enough provision for persons and officials of the INEC, the media, the law enforcement bodies, candidates’ returning officers and others that must be present at polls counting and announcement. Therefore, anyone out of these designated officials, is not needed because their presence in the past, caused falsification of the outcome of elections.
“It is the interference that causes rigging, violence, lack of trust of the system by the masses and ultimately, annulment of election results. Elections rerun take a toll on the economy of the INEC and the nation. To conduct an election to fill a House of Representative slot in about two local governments that make up a constituency could cost INEC about N2 billion and in senatorial re-run elections, the cost is far higher.”
He added: “If, for instance, about five candidates in the election spend an average of N300 million, that is another N1.5 billion. At last, the money becomes waste as candidates who feel aggrieved by falsified results go to the tribunal to spend another round of money and that creates tension, which threatens the security of the area and ultimately, the nation.
“The cost of every rerun is so colossal that if government takes the appropriate measures to guard against them by eliminating those unwanted agents at the state and council levels, we would have saved so much to make our elections more credible,” the source noted.
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