Raw polls results for Saturday’s Presidential and National Assembly elections would not be communicated online during the exercise, Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC chairman Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, , has said. l
Prof Yakub said Presiding Officers (Pos) will be expected to utilize the BVAS equipment to snap the election results from each polling station and upload them to the INEC Result Viewing Portal for Nigerians to view.
This was disclosed at a meeting with leaders of International Election Observers at the Commission’s Head Office in Abuja, saying the decision to not submit raw numbers electronically was made to prevent hacking since raw figures are more vulnerable to hacking.
He informed foreign observers that the commission’s choice not to provide raw statistics is the fundamental difference between the Kenyan experience and what it is doing.
Prof. Yakubu also stated that the polls will take place as scheduled since the Commission had mobilized all relevant government entities to ensure the exercise’s success.
He said that the Bimodal Voter Identification System (BVAS) used in the elections is anticipated to accomplish three primary tasks.
“It validates that the cards supplied by the commission and submitted by the voter are real, and the voter is confirmed using the fingerprint and, where the fingerprint fails, the face,” he says. When both fail, the voter is unable to vote. It is a legal issue.
“Once the process is done at the polling unit, the picture of the polling unit result will be captured by the BVAS and posted into what we call the INEC Result Viewing Portal where people may watch polling unit level results as the procedures are completed at polling unit level.
“The difference between what Kenya did in 2015 and what we are doing is that we are not submitting raw statistics for collation. In reality, the law forbids automated compilation of results.
“Therefore, we don’t transfer raw statistics since raw figures communicated online are more vulnerable to hackers, while photographs of a document are not.”
