YIAGA Africa on Wednesday announced that the Independent National Electoral Commission’s announcement of the presidential election in Rivers and Imo State is in sharp contrast with its own record observed from the polls.
“The state-level presidential results for Imo and Rivers State are inconsistent with the YIAGA Africa Watching The Votes projections for both states.
“For Rivers, INEC announced 231591 votes for APC on 44.2 per cent, 175, 071 votes for the Labour party(33.4 per cent), and 88,468 for Peoples Democratic Party representing 16.9 per cent.
“This is in sharp contrast to the YIAGA Africa estimate for Rivers which are: APC, 21. 7 % plus minus 5 per cent, for the Labour Party, 50.8 per cent plus minus 10.6, PDP, 22.2 per cent plus-minus 6 per cent,” Member of the YIAGA’s board, Dr Aisha Abdulahi, revealed during its Post-election statement on the 2023 presidential election.
The press conference was attended by officials of the United Nations, European Union and Civil Society Groups.
Speaking further, Aisha said YIAGA’s observers obtained its data through random sampling of several polling units totalling over 1,500 polling units.
For Imo state, Aisha disclosed that though INEC announced 66,406 votes for APC or 14.2%, 360,495 for LP or 77.1% and 30,234 for PDP or 6.5%, its estimate from the state puts APC at 5.1 per cent plus or minus 2.3 per cent, LP at 88.1 per cent (plus or minus 3.8 per cent) while PDP had 5.7 percent (plus or minus 2.3 per cent).
YIAGA maintained that there were alleged inconsistencies in the presidential election results, particularly from Rivers and Imo states.
According to the in-depth research group, it found 8 instances (0.5 per cent of polling units) of irregularities in voter turnout where turnout was allegedly over 100%.
It also advised that INEC should probe results from states where announcements were made under duress.
“Yiaga Africa notes that these polling units may have been cancelled at the point of collation. Yiaga Africa urges INEC to publish a list of all cancelled polling units,” she said.
In its preliminary recommendations on Wednesday, Yiaga called for a comprehensive audit and investigation to unravel the factors resulting in the delayed upload of election results on INEC’s online portal, saying it is “critical”.
He added that anyone found complicit in sabotaging this “critical aspect of the election should be sanctioned,” describing the electoral umpire’s failure to immediately upload results from polling units as a “flagrant disregard” of its guidelines.
Yiaga insisted that INEC has to clarify the inconsistencies in some of the results especially the presidential election results from Rivers and Imo states.
Other recommendations are as follows: “Voting hours should be extended to 5 pm to increase voter participation in subsequent elections.
“Legal timelines for testing new electoral technologies should be introduced to Nigeria’s electoral legal framework.
“INEC should provide clarification on its interpretation of key aspects of the legal framework on issues like results collation and transmission process, the threshold for determining the winner in an election and the Commission’s power to review election results declared under duress or in contravention of the Electoral Act, INEC guidelines and manual.
“INEC should sustain the uploads of polling units results in form EC 8A on its IReV portal.”
As for the already announced results by INEC Headquarters, Aisha said it still “falls within our confidence limits and our margin of errors.”
“Based on reports from 97 per cent (1,453 of 1,507) of sampled polling units, Yiaga Africa’s statistical analysis shows that the All Progressives Congress (APC) should receive between 34.4 and 37.4 per cent of the vote, Labour Party (LP) should receive between 24.2 and 28.4 per cent of the votes, the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) should receive between 4.6 and 6.4 per cent of the votes, People’s Democratic Party (PDP) should receive between 28.3 and 31.1 per cent of the vote, while no other political party should receive more than 0.3 per cent of the vote,” she said.
But she made it clear that Yiaga Africa’s statistical analysis on the presidential election was based on the number of registered voters and not on the number of PVCs collected.
There are about 176,846 polling units in Nigeria.
Furthermore, Yiaga said “the 2023 Presidential and National Assembly Elections were a missed opportunity with factors like the serious logistical and technological shortcomings undermining public confidence in INEC and the outcome.
“Inconsistent presidential state results for Imo and Rivers State makes abundantly clear that drastic steps are now needed and INEC must be fundamentally reformed,” Yiaga Africa added.
