INEC Begins “Train The Trainer” Training On Use Of BVAS
Princess-Ekwi Ajide Abuja
The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, has begun training of its staff ahead of the 2023 General Election on effective handling of BVAS and other technologies introduced by the Commission.
A total of 82 officials drawn from INEC offices across the nation are currently receiving intensive hands-on training on the new technologies after which they will train more officials at zonal level to cover all the 8,809 Registration Areas (or Wards) who in turn, will be involved in the training of ad hoc staff for the 176,846 Polling Units in the country
In his remarks at the opening ceremony of the training, the Chairman of the Commission, Professor Mahmood Yakubu, stated that owing to experiences garnered from recent off-cycle elections, the Commission is convinced that a critical success factor in the deployment of technology in elections is training hence it needs to build the capacity of staff involved not only to competently handle the devices during the accreditation process but also to respond effectively to any glitches that may occur during elections.
He said the Commission’s plan for the 2023 General Election is to commence the training of election officials early and for a longer period of time for optimal understanding of the processes and procedures in order to serve Nigerians better.
Professor Yakubu, noted that in the last two years, the Commission has increased the deployment of technology in the elections in Nigeria as 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 to the accreditation of polling agents, observers and journalists for elections.
The INEC Chairman opined that of these innovations, which have increased transparency and public confidence in the electoral process 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.
He emphasised that the combination of the BVAS and the IReV portal have come to stay as a means of voter accreditation and transmission of election results, saying that the 3-day training of master trainers to serve as Registration Area Technical Support (RATECH).
In a goodwill message, the Country Director International Foundation for Electoral Systems, IFES Nigeria, Seray Jah, said the training is significant as 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 elections, using the Electoral Act 2022.
He stressed the training would help the Commission generate a pool of master trainers that will support the cascade training of over 10, 000 technical support staff across the 36 states and the FCT, for the 2023 general elections.
