The CLEEN Foundation has called on the Inspector General of Police (IGP) to ensure the welfare package of police officers on election duties are improved.
The Foundation made the call in a statement by its acting Executive Director, Ruth Olofin, Saturday and made available to Blueprint in Abuja.
According to the body, “the proper and adequate remuneration of security personnel will boost the motivation and ensure that officers carry out their mandate without prejudice or undue influence by political actors.”
The acting director also stressed the need for the electoral body to improve on the distribution of election materials to avoid disenfranchisement of citizens.
This is just as it implored citizens to exercise patience amidst logistic challenges INEC is currently facing.
“We encourage citizens to keep faith in the process and exercise their civic responsibility.
“INEC should improve the response time for addressing the BVAS challenges to increase voters’ trust in the process.
“We encourage registered voters to go out and exercise their franchise as the election has been generally observed to be peaceful,” it said.
On the logistics and operational challenges, the Foundation observed that voting did not commence early in some polling units due to malfunctioning of the Biometric Voters Accreditation System (BVAS) which was newly introduced and deployed for this election.
“For Instance, in Polling Units 010,011 & 014, Ward 3, Dunukofia LGA, there were reports of late accreditation due to the malfunction of the BVAS. Similarly, at virtually all the polling units at Ward 2, Anambra East LGA, and Polling unit 4,ward 4, Abaga, Njikoka LGA, we observed the malfunctioning of the BVAS and poor logistics by INEC including delayed commencement of polls.
“Furthermore, at Polling Units 001 & 002, Ward 5, Orumba South LGA, the BVAS were observed to malfunction and could not authenticate the fingerprints of voters. Also, at Ward 2, Aguata LGA, we observed the same challenge of the BVAS, however, INEC.
“In spite of these challenges, INEC “officials were seen working hard to reach their ICT centers to resolve the issues. Similarly, at polling unit 010, ward 8, the BVAS Machine was observed not to work. However, INEC Technicians were there to fix the devices,” Olofin said.
