Electoral body strategising ahead of 2019 elections

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has already begun working on a strategy that will ensure the success of elections in the country in 2019, an official said.

Mr Rotimi Oyekanmi, the Chief Press Secretary to INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Monday that part of the strategy had already been perfected, while the others were at advanced stages.

Oyekanmi expressed optimism that with the strategy that the INEC Chairman and his management team were working on, the 2019 general elections would consolidate the successes recorded in 2016.

“Work has started; our ICT Department is bringing out a lot of innovations, because our Chairman has promised that the success that technology has enable us to record in 2015 will be consolidated.

“There is no time for experimentation as our chairman has always said. We are leveraging on the success to now take things beyond.

“And one of the innovations already introduced is simultaneous accreditation and voting, which saves a lot of time and has proved to be very successful.

“The Continuous Voters Registration will commence very soon. It will be possible for people to locate their cards (permanent Voter cards) and be able to retrieve them.

“Those, who are transferring from one place to the other will also to be able to do that online.

“A lot of structure are been put in place but at the right time Nigerians will hear what the preparations are. There are some that cannot be discussed because they are still in process.

“But let me tell you from the first day that the chairman took over office, efforts started towards 2019 general elections because it is a process and you have to do one after the other.

“We are not going to wait; that we not be a wise thing to do. As we move along we are inventing new strategies.’’

Oyekanmi said that under Yakubu’s supervision, INEC had been able to discover ways of dealing with election challenges.

He added that the commission would fall back on the experiences from previous elections to successfully conduct future elections.