INEC Knocks Tinubu: BVAS: ‘Something Is Terribly Wrong Somewhere’

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has slammed the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, for questioning the credibility of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) and Results Viewing Portal.
Recall that Tinubu said on Monday at the Chattam House that INEC had yet to assure Nigerians of the BVAS’s functionality and e-transmission of poll results.

“We are still building confidence in our democratic and voting system,” said the former Lagos State governor. Before we introduce a complicated element of ballot counting, INEC must assure us that electronic transmission, the technology used for accreditation and total vote count, is reliable, dependable, and assuring in our democratic process.”

The BVAS Technology
In response to Tinubu’s remarks, INEC’s Chief Press Secretary, Mr Rotimi Oyekanmi, questioned why the APC presidential candidate would question the technology used in several polls, including the off-season governorship elections in Ekiti, Osun, and Anambra states.

According to him, the commission has been discussing the features, strengths, and advantages of BVAS since 2020.

“Since 2020, when it was introduced to replace our beloved Smart Card Reader, the Independent National Electoral Commission has been talking about the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, its features, strengths, and advantages,” Oyekanmi stated.

“It has always been on the agenda and discussed at every quarterly meeting that the commission has held with leaders of political parties since this BVAS was introduced, and I am talking about more than five meetings.” My assumption is that the national chairman and secretary of each political party represented at our meetings will also brief their presidential candidates on the issues discussed.

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More importantly, we have used the BVAS to conduct off-season governorship elections in Ekiti, Osun, and Anambra states, and all of these elections have been described and accepted as free, fair, credible, and inclusive by all. The governors who were elected have been quietly enjoying their terms. Not to mention that we used it for the Federal Capital Territory area council election, which was a huge success.

“The BVAS has been trending on social media platforms, and even first-time visitors to Nigeria are asking, ‘What is this BVAS thing?”

There is no turning back.
Furthermore, he dismissed speculations that INEC had abandoned the use of BVAS, emphasizing that the deployment of BVAS for the 2023 general election is unabated.

“Therefore, if we still have a presidential candidate of one of the 18 registered political parties saying he needs assurances on the BVAS or he doesn’t know or appreciate its relevance to the 2023 general election at this point in 2022, then something is terribly wrong somewhere,” he added.