NEWS UPDATE

THE Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Professor Joash Amupitan (SAN), has attributed the technical glitches recorded during August 1 mock accreditation exercise in Osun State to compatibility issues involving old Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs), assuring voters that the problem was identified and resolved within an hour.

Addressing the press men, on Saturday at the INEC headquarters in Osogbo after monitoring the exercise, Amupitan explained that the mock accreditation successfully achieved its objective of exposing potential technical challenges ahead of the August 15 governorship election.

According to him, the commission’s Information and Communication Technology (ICT) team promptly intervened after reports emerged that some older PVCs were not being recognised by the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS).

“We initially had a minor hitch, and I call it minor because if it happened during the election, it would have been a major hitch,” Amupitan said.

“We discovered that most of the old cards were not being accredited. This was a result of what we call a compatibility score, or a similarity score. The moment we were alerted, our ICT team worked on it and within one hour the issue was resolved. We didn’t have to wait until election day.”

He explained that some PVCs issued as far back as 2011 had become worn out or defaced, making them difficult for the machines to read, adding that the commission had earlier considered validating such cards for that reason.

The INEC chairman stressed that the mock exercise was organised to detect and resolve any technical issues before the governorship election, noting that a similar incident on election day could easily have been misinterpreted as a complete failure of the BVAS.

“We want to identify problems ahead of time. If this had happened on election day, many people would have concluded that BVAS had failed. But we have the capacity to overcome every challenge,” he added.

Amupitan also announced that the commission had increased the number of BVAS machines for the election from 4,427 to 5,130 following concerns raised by political parties over deployment.

According to him, the additional machines will cater for split polling units in Ife East, Irewole, Egbedore, Ede North and Osogbo Local Government Areas.

He further disclosed that the number of backup BVAS machines had been doubled from 664 to 1,328 to ensure prompt replacement of any faulty device during the election.

Voice Air Media reports that INEC conducted the statewide mock accreditation exercise on Saturday to test the functionality of the BVAS and other electoral processes ahead of the August 15 Osun State governorship election.