The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has declared Olaka Nwogu of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) the winner of the Rivers State southeast senatorial district by-election. The commission said it had successfully managed the technical glitches that disrupted the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) during the poll.
The by-election was conducted to fill the seat left vacant by the death of Senator Barinada Mpigi, who represented the Rivers southeast senatorial district, earlier this year. The poll was held alongside off-cycle elections taking place in some other parts of the country.
The senatorial district covers seven local government areas, namely Andoni, Tai, Khana, Gokana, Eleme, Oyigbo and Opobo/Nkoro. Four political parties contested the by-election: the AA, the APC, the LP and the PDP.
The exercise had been affected by technical problems at several polling units. Network challenges disrupted accreditation through the BVAS in parts of Wards 1, 3, 4 and 6, as well as in other areas within Gokana local government area.
Stakeholders in Gokana expressed concern over the technical challenges, which they said caused delays in the accreditation of voters at some of the affected polling units.
According to accounts from the polling units, many people who had turned out in large numbers and whose names appeared on the register could not be captured by the machine, leaving them unable to vote at the time.
Concerned parties at the affected units said the malfunction was disenfranchising eligible voters, and noted that manual accreditation was not being allowed as an alternative when the device failed to work.
Those affected had called on INEC to deploy incident forms and take steps to ensure that eligible voters were not disenfranchised, while some urged that backup arrangements be made available so that voting could continue where the machines had failed.