Molly Kilete, Abuja
There was frustration among electoral officers and voters at Orozo, Karshi Gidan Mangoro areas of the Federal Capital Territory(FCT) following the Poor performance of Biometric Voters Accreditation System(BVAS) deployed to the various polling units during Saturday’s council elections.
The voters who turned out in their thousands as early as six o’clock and waited for the electoral officers to arrive were disappointed as the BVAS, started developing problems shortly after accreditation started.
Voting at most of the polling units visited started as early as 8:30, but as at 12;45, in the afternoon, not more fifteen persons had voted in some areas.
The situation led to pandemonium as the voters turned their angers to the electoral officers. At some of the polling units visited, the security personnel deployed to maintain law and order were overwhelmed by the crowd who they could not control.
It took the intervention of the polling officers who kept pleading with the electorates to be patients to bring the situation under control.
At polling units 005, located in front of the secretariat, the polling office David Emmanuel complained about the malfunctioning of the BVAS, which he said performed excellently when they started accreditation. Officer said that even though he had reported the matter to his supervisors, they were yet to rectify the problem as at 12:45 in the afternoon.
According to him, he alongside his colleagues were on ground at exactly 7 o’clock in the morning to set up the unit for voting.
He said Special attention was given to the elderly, people with disabilities, pregnant women and women with children to vote before others.
At polling units 029, beside the Karshi General hospital which was virtually empty with no voters in sight, the polling officer said only five people turned out to cast their vote. They attributed the low turn out to the fact that it was a new unit created not long ago.
However the story was different at unit 004, near the primary health center where thousands of voters turned out as presiding officers battled to get the BVAS function.
The polling officer Oko Patrick, attributed the malfunctioning to the heat from the scorching sun. He said that even though they were on ground as early as 7 o’clock, the weather has not been friendly to the BVAS as they find it difficult to accredite voters.
As at one o’clock, he said they have not been able to accredite the number of voters they ought to have accredited if the machines were in good working conditions.
He however expressed the hope that the supervising officers who were on their way at the time we visited the polling units would be able to rectify the situation.
At polling unit 001, located at Orozo primary school, the story was the same as voters who turned out as early as 7 o’clock were yet to cast their vote as at 1:30 in the afternoon as a result of the poor performance of the BVAS.
The presiding officer who attributed the delay to the malfunctioning of the BVAS, said “the BVAS, are not capturing as fast, and there is too much delay and if you try to see what it qring with it, it will just trip off.
He said “we came as early as 7 o’clock and got all the necessary materials before we started but as you can see, the process is very slow. We have over 6,000 accredited voters and i can tell you that we have not been able to accredit much.