The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has for the second time in 12 hours postponed the collation of results earlier scheduled for Sunday evening at 6.00pm until Monday at 11 a.m.
The electoral body explained that most of the states are expected to complete the collation of results by Sunday night.
Persecondnews recalls that the INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu had fixed 12pm on Sunday for the collation at a news briefing.
INEC National Chairman, Yakubu said the commission expects the results of the other 35 states and the Federal Capital Territory and moved the national collation to 11am on Monday.
Mahmood also said the collation of presidential election results will be done at four levels — first at the 8,889 wards, then at the 774 local government areas, then the state collation officers for the presidential election (SCOPs) at the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory will submit the votes per candidate in Abuja.
He said the collation centre will be open all day and all night with short breaks.
He also cautioned political parties against flying unapproved and unofficial results.
“I appeal to all political parties and media organisations to draw their figures only from the official results released by the commission as the only body constitutionally responsible for releasing official election figures.”
Elections into the office of the President, 360 House of Representatives and 109 Senatorial seats were held on Saturday and the Federal Capital Territory and Nigerians expect results to be declared by the electoral body.
Meanwhile, INEC has allayed fears that results from polling units in the 2023 general elections across the country are safe and cannot be altered.
A statement by the the INEC Commissioner for Information and Voter Education Committee, Mr Festus Okoye,
expressed regret over the malfunctioning of the INEC Results Viewing portal (IReV), and urged Nigerians to avoid actions that could instigate the commission against the public.
“These results cannot be tampered with and any discrepancy between them and the physical results used in collation will be thoroughly investigated and remediated, in line with Section 65 of the Electoral Act 2022.”
It said the challenges were caused by technical hitches resulting from the advancement of the IReV portal from a platform for state elections to one capable of managing nationwide voting.
“It is, indeed, not unusual for glitches to occur and be corrected in such situations. Consequently, the Commission wishes to assure Nigerians that the challenges are not due to any intrusion or sabotage of our systems, and that the ReV remains well-secured.
“Our technical team is working assiduously to solve all the outstanding problems, and users of the IReV would have noticed improvements since last night,” he said.
The Commission assumed responsibility for the problem and expressed regret over the distress experienced by candidates, political parties and voters over the issue.
Nigerians and spokesmen of parties have condemned the delay in uploading election results on the IReV portal, which has left many doubting the credibility of the process.
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