By Nathaniel Gana
The Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, has assured that the Commission will train election duty officials early and for a longer period of time in order to serve Nigerians better in the 2023 general election.
He gave the assurance at the opening of a two-day training of master trainers on election technology for the 2023 General Election, organised with support from the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) and held in Abuja, on Tuesday, October 18, 2022,
The INEC Chairman noted that over the last two years, the Commission has introduced several innovations that have increased the transparency of the electoral process.
According to him, “systems and portals have been designed and developed to cater for different electoral activities ranging from voter registration and accreditation; result transmission from the polling units; the nomination of candidates by political parties; the accreditation of polling agents, observers, and journalists for elections.”
Prof. Yakubu added that, “Of these innovations, most Nigerians are more familiar with the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS), which doubles as a device for accreditation as well as the upload of the Polling Unit level result sheets to the INEC Result Viewing (IReV) portal in real-time on election day.”
“These innovations have increased transparency and public confidence in the electoral process. They are also part of the legal requirements for conducting elections in Nigeria. The combination of the BVAS and the IReV portal has come to stay as a means of voter accreditation and transmission of election results.”
Prof. Yakubu noted that, learning from the experience of the recently conducted Ekiti and Osun state governorship elections, the Commission was convinced that a critical success factor in the deployment of technology in elections is early and adequate training for election duty officials, and assured of INEC’s determination to build the capacity of the staff to competently handle the election devices.
For the Master Trainers, the INEC Chairman explained that 82 INEC staff drawn from different offices nationwide will be intensively trained over the next 3 days and will in-turn cascade the training for Registration Area Technical Support (RATECH) to all officials that will man all the polling units and wards in the country.
He said: “Today, we begin the process with the training of master trainers to serve as Registration Area Technical Support (RATECH). A total of 82 officials drawn from our offices nationwide will form the nucleus of the training. Over the next three days, they will receive intensive hands-on training on the new technology.”
“Thereafter, they will train more officials at the zonal level to cover all the 8,809 Registration Areas (or wards). In turn, these officials will be involved in the training of ad-hoc staff for the 176,846 polling units nationwide.”
Prof. Yakubu urged the 82 staff involved to pay special attention to the training, challenging them that “your role as master trainers is critical to the success of training at subsequent levels and ultimately the successful deployment of the devices during elections.”
For this reason, the Commission will not accept laxity on your part. As much as we have confidence in your ability to understand and discharge your responsibilities to the officials you will subsequently train, there will be consequences for unethical behaviour or any act of misconduct on your part.
The Chairman, Board of the Electoral Institute (TEI), and National Commissioner, Prof. Abdulahi Zuru, stressed the premium the Commission places on staff training. He said, “The special training and retraining of all categories of electoral personnel for the delivery of effective and efficient electoral services at all levels is a standing principle of the Commission.”
He said the Commission will rely on the Master Trainers to cascade the training down the line to about 1 million ad-hoc staff who will be the face of the commission to the voters.
In a goodwill message, the Country Director for IFES, Seray Jah, emphasised the significance of the training. He said it presents a huge opportunity for the Commission to enhance the transparency and credibility of elections through the deployment of technology on a large scale for the conduct of the 2023 general election.
He added that the training helps the Commission to generate a pool of master trainers that will support the cascading training of over 10, 000 technical support staff across 36 states and the FCT for the 2023 general election.