Elections: Confusion As 22 BVAS Goes Missing

22 Bimodal Voters Accreditation System (BVAS) in Rivers State for the Governorship and House of Assembly polls have reportedly gone missing.

The 22 are part of the over 6865 of the machines deployed to the state for Saturday’s polls.

It was gathered that three of the accreditation machines were damaged beyond repairs, hence cannot be used for the polls.

Speaking to newsmen and election observers, the Resident Electoral Commissioner in the state, Johnson Alalibo, stated that the development would not affect the process.

According to him, INEC has enough back-up systems, adding that the missing ones would not disturb the process in anyway.

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He said that the electoral umpire would ensure that those missing gadgets would not be used by criminals, promising that election results would be uploaded in real time after the voting process, assuring of a free and fair process.

However, the State representative of the YIAGA Africa, Obinna Ebogidi, has called on the electoral umpire to ensure that their promise of enough machines should to be guaranteed.

Ebogidi said: “The REC told us that 22 of the BVAS machines are missing while “6865 BVAS machines have been reconfigured ahead of Saturday’s poll.

“Our concern is that results should be uploaded from the polling units early to avoid a repeat of what transferred in the last election.”