He also pointed out that in Kwara State there are some register books starting with 101, when opened afresh to registrants. He wondered where the remaining 100 leaflets went to.
However, in his reaction to the allegation, the spokesman of INEC in the state, Mr. Jacob Ayanda, said no machine was missing.
He explained that the machines were supplied according to the polling units spread across the state and that no politician or any political party was consulted before INEC carried out the exercise.
Mohammed challenged INEC in Kwara State to provide answers to these posers so as to renew confidence of the party in the ongoing exercise and arrest desperate attempts by some people to rig in the forthcoming elections..
According to him,’ Six days after the commencement of this exercise, I can tell you authoritatively that 187 of the DDC machines meant for the people of kwara are no where to be found.In ilorin west local government 32 DDC machines are missing, in Moro local government, 14 DDC machines are not found in Baruten 11 were no where to be found, in Oyun local government, 5 DDC machines are not seen and so on and so forth. These are posers for INEC. Rigging starts from here, we urgently demand from INEC to answer these questions”
He also sought to know whether a state like kwara battling with dearth of DDC machines and other logistics problems would be granted extension in the time frame so as to register all potential voters across the state.
INEC must apologise over lapses—Belgore
Ilorin—The governorship candidate of Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN, in Kwara State, Mohammed Dele Belgore (SAN), yesterday urged the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, to apologise to Nigerians over the shaky start of the ongoing voters’ registration exercise.
Belgore said this in an interview with journalists shortly after he was registered at his Oke Ogun registration unit in Ilorin yesterday.
Belgore urged INEC to make a formal statement to Nigerians, adding that it “will give Nigerians comfort and assurance as well as tell them what to expect in days ahead.”
Speaking on the missing DDC machines, the ACN governorship candidate said: “we have heard few reports of such allegations. We are looking into them.
“Once we can substantiate them we will pass them to INEC and we will let the world know. But at the moment the allegations remain unsubstantiated.”
At the moment it will be very irresponsible of me o make allegations that I cannot substantiate.”
He also called on INEC to “ heed the people’s complaints that in certain places Direct Data Capturing (DDC) machines are not available. That should be addressed very quickly.
“We took all these complaints to INEC, the assurance they gave us is that the complaints are being looked into and they would get better. My advice to INEC is that they should make the process a bit speedier. Perhaps, INEC should upgrade the software of its scanners in such a way that it does not take too long to register. The average time now it takes a person to register is about 10minutes. That is if things are working very well. If they are not working well it could be 30minutes or an hour.
“My own personal experience today is that the exercise went well. It hasn’t always been this well for everybody. The assurance we have from INEC is that it is getting better by the day and I have seen some signs to that effect.
“I didn’t go round myself personally to other wards, but we have people going round and we are getting field reports. It was a very shaky start. In some places machines will not arrive on time. In some places where machines arrived they were not working, the scanners were slow if they were working at all.”
Speaking on the issue of extension of the time frame for the exercise, Belgore said,“it is perhaps too early to call for an extension. If people want to register and they are unable to that amounts to disenfranchisement which will be unconstitutional and against the law of the land. Should that happen as a result of the fact that INEC has not done what it should do, then an extension is a necessity at that point.
“But at this point it is too early for me to call for an extension.”
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