He disclosed while he was in a consultative meeting with the pressmen in Abuja.
Prof Mahmood Yakubu, the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on Thursday said that there is a high tendency of moving sensitive election materials from the Central Bank of Nigeria to another place.
He disclosed while he was in a consultative meeting with the pressmen in Abuja.
The INEC chairman added that the electoral body would employ both the manual and electronic methods in the transmission of the 2023 elections results.
When asked about the political ambition and partisanship of the governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele, Yakubu said this may force the commission to find another arrangement for the handling of sensitive materials.
He said, “But we are already started talking about what alternatives are available to us in case we need to change the arrangement for the handling of sensitive materials. We have started thinking about it. We are aware of the situation. We will watch the situation. We still have nine months before the next general elections.
“Things may be addressed before then. I want to assure you that we will not jeopardise the conduct of the election by creating a misconception around the situation in the process.”
According to him, INEC would partner with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission to check the spending of political parties during the 2023 election.
Yakubu added that the provision of the Electoral Act 2022 in the management of results was still basically manual involving the recording of results on forms and their delivery to various levels of collation until declaration and returns are made.
While declaring however that the law still provided for e-transmission of results, Yakubu quoted Section 64 of the Electoral Act, saying that electronic transmission of results would only be done in the event of a dispute during the course of collation.
He said there was a reason to explain the misunderstanding around e-transmission of results, stating that many Nigerians likened it to electronic voting where voting could take place from any location.
A brief contained in the implementation procedure for electronic transmission of results given to journalists at the parley said the presiding officer was expected to transmit a clear image of form EC8A (result sheets) for purpose of collation which goes to the INEC Results Viewing Portal
According to the document, the PO is also expected to deliver the hard copy of EC8A and the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, BVAS to the Registration Collation Officer.