Since the card reader machines of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) were put to test a few days ago during the mock elections conducted in 12 states of the federation, various news media have been awash with the results of the exercise. Although the machines produced varying results across the states, the overall verdict was that the card reader machines failed. They did not work in most of the places where they were used.
Problems associated with the machines include their inability to recognise the fingerprints of voters who are armed with their Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) in some states, and the short lifespan of the batteries. Some of the machines’ batteries were said to have packed up after about three hours of operation. This lapse is believed to be a big issue in an election that is supposed to last over six hours. The failure of the machines to confirm the biometric information of potential voters is even a more serious lapse. Such failure means automatic disqualification of the voters involved.
Besides, the machines were said to have worked in some states with little hitches while it failed to work in some others. Reports from some voting centres indicated that authenticating the cards through fingerprints resulted in hiccups, to the extent that of about 80 voters verified, only about four were authenticated successfully. The machines were said to have constantly beeped “verification failed”. This is in spite of the fact that the names and photographs of the affected voters were located on the electronic register.
It was also reported that in the bid to make the machines work, INEC officials had to use soaps and detergents to wash the thumbs of potential voters so that the machines could recognise them. Yet, this did not help matters.
Going by the rules of the electoral commission, accreditation of voters is supposed to last for 300 minutes. It is expected that verification of a voter, ideally, should last for one minute. That means that only 300 people can be verified in 300 minutes. The further implication of this is that in a voting unit where you have more than 300 people, the rest will have to go home without casting their votes. This is bad enough as many polling units have registered voters in excess of 800 to 1,000.
Besides, the fact that the authentication exercise, going by the observed hitches, takes more than five minutes to deal with the case of a voter, we are likely to find ourselves in a situation where the machines will not verify up to 50 voters throughout the period of accreditation. The result will be massive disenfranchisement of voters.
In a distrustful political setting such as ours, the use of PVCs could be a tool for disenfranchisement of voters. This can be selectively done to favour one political party and disadvantage the other, depending on the objective the operators plan to achieve.
The outcome of the mock trials of the machines has clearly vindicated the position of those who have argued that the card reader machines should not be used for the forthcoming elections. A new technology such as this ought not to be rushed into. It could be put to the test over time to create room for operators to get used to the way it works before it can be deployed for general elections. Yet, those who know next to nothing about the machines have been busy defending its use. They have been doing so not out of knowledge, but merely on the strength of partisanship. Unfortunately, politics in Nigeria has blinded a lot of people to the reality of certain issues. This is what we are experiencing in the case of the card reader machines.
But we must note, in spite of our pockets of biases, that the 2015 general elections are too crucial to be subjected to the vagaries of trial and error. The electoral commission, from what happened during the mock elections, should jettison the use of the card reader machine. No wonder Humphrey Nwosu, a professor and former boss of the electoral commission, remarked recently that the introduction of the machines would bring unnecessary complication to the elections. He was right. Attahiru Jega, chairman of INEC, should listen to such wise counsel and save the nation from the catastrophic adoption of the card reader machines.
In the face of the glaring pitfalls of the card reader machines, it is strange that one of the political parties, the All Progressives Congress (APC), is insisting on its use. In the same vein, Jega has been insisting that the card readers must be used. Jega’s case beats the imagination. He did not test the card readers, yet he said all was well. And even after seeing the loopholes in its use, Jega is still acting deaf and dumb. Someone needs to call this man to order. The president should rein in Jega and make him realise that he is on a national assignment. He is not sent to INEC to ingratiate his ego and cause confusion in the process. As for the APC, the party must realize that propaganda has its limits. The party and Jega wanted to stampede Nigeria into an election that the commission was not prepared for. INEC was not ready, yet Jega, goaded on by APC, said everything was in place. One then begins to wonder at the synergy between APC and Jega. Why is the INEC boss always right in the eyes of the APC? There must be something about their relationship than meets the eye.
But I do think that the veil has been removed from the eyes of Nigerians. They did not see clearly before. But the postponement of the elections and the insistence on propriety have opened their eyes to the reality. This reality is that there is an unholy liaison between Jega and APC. But the game is up. Jega should save Nigeria from unnecessary headache by jettisoning the card reader machines.
DUCOR HANDELL
