Politics
Political Class Not Fair To Rivers
Elder Aniedi Ikoiwak, Resident Electoral Commissioner
Elder Aniedi Ikoiwak is
the Resident Electoral Commissioner of the Independent National Electoral Commission in Rivers State. In this interview with Opaka Dokubo in his office in Port Harcourt, the returnee REC bared his mind on a number of issues including the political atmosphere in the State and the re-run elections that took place last weekend. Excerpts:
Compare the Rivers State you left behind and the one you have come back to meet with regard to your work
There is more involvement of political actors and more division. Before now, it was like a one way movement when I was here.
I left here in 2014 and at that time, the political environment had changed from what it used to be in 2011 which was like a one way traffic but now you have traffic coming from many directions. So, there’s bound to be some level of disagreement, some level of interest here and there. It’s not new except that sometimes people capitalize on that to cause problem in the community. But the political tension is not something that is not supposed to be there, it’s supposed to be there but the situation is that you now have gladiators who in the past had been in one camp and now you have them in different camps. So, there’s bound to be some conflict.
Why Were You Brought Back?
I don’t determine where I go to. The Commission determines where officers are posted to. Incidentally, I have been posted, in my years in the Commission, to many places, sometimes on adhoc basis. I have been in Imo State for three months. I have also had situation where I had been posted along with every other person. I was in Bauchi in 2007. I had served in Edo still on general posting. I have served in Kwara still on general posting. I have been to Rivers on general posting. I have been to Delta on general posting. And my coming here now is on general posting too because I am not the only person who was posted. There are others who were posted. The person who took over from me was in Bayelsa.
So, different people are sent on assignment at different times may be because of your capacity and competence. But not because of, what somebody will say, vested interest. There is no other interest other than that of the Commission and I have gone on assignment at different times, still in the interest of the Commission.
Is The Situation Conducive Enough For Free, Fair And Credible Election In Rivers State?
I think that conducting a free, fair and credible election is not the responsibility of the Commission alone. Every other stakeholder need to contribute their quota to the making of a free, fair and credible election. And that takes me to the issue of security. Free and fair election does not consist of only having the materials, distributing the materials and so on. What happens if the environment does not allow the voters to come out?
Would you call it, a free and fair election here the voters was not even allowed to come out?
So, I think that as we approach the election, we should try as much as possible to douse tension. We in the Commission we are doing our best to douse tension. When I came in here, a lot of people were talking about adhoc staff and I made it clear that adhoc will only be recruited from where INEC has said they should be recruited from. That is why you don’t find anybody at the gate coming to submit a list.
The directive is for us to write to the heads of federal institutions, including universities to give us specified categories of persons and not we going to recruit by ourselves. This is because if any of them is found wanting, we hold the head responsible. The list I have from the University of Port Harcourt is signed by the Vice Chancellor; from the Federal College of Education, it is signed by the Rector; from the Federal University, Otuoke, it is signed by the Vice Chancellor. All the federal institutions from where we have recruited staff, their lists are signed by their heads of the institutions.
Of course, that has, indirectly, brought down some level of tension. So, we expect the political parties to follow suit.
What Number Are We Looking At?
We are looking at over 20,000. We are getting about 7,000 from the NYSC. We are getting another seven to eight thousand from the students. The students are not going to preside; they are going to be assistant presiding officers. In areas where we don’t have corps members like Emohua and some places in Etche, we will deploy INEC staff in those areas.
The Commission has also approved staff from neighbouring States. Staff will come from Delta, Edo, Cross River, Akwa Ibom and Bayelsa who will also join in complementing the effort of other staff of federal agencies, universities and our staff.
What Strategy For Conducive Atmosphere?
The strategy is to work with the security agencies. I am not a security personnel. My duty is to conduct election. But I also think that the people of Rivers State should also give peace a chance. I mean the leaders of this State. It is not fair that there are reports of killings and so on in the State everyday in the media.
It’s not fair to the State because the State will need people to come, the State will need investment. A lot of things will come to the State. Port Harcourt is a first class city in Nigeria. It should not be brought down to a point where Port Harcourt is seen as a village.
When somebody comes to Nigeria, he looks at Lagos, Kano, Abuja, Port Harcourt. That is always the picture. We should not bring it to a point where when Port Harcourt is mentioned, they will push it aside and look at others. It should not be. We must realise that the growth of Port Harcourt is also the growth of the South – South region.
What Challenges Ahead?
When we talk about challenges we are talking about areas that we should focus on. You see, conduct of election entails the preparation which we have done, materials distribution. Now that INEC has said we should not distribute materials from our offices and that it should be at the RACs, the RACs are in the villages where we domicile materials and personnel. That is the area to focus on. Because they are in the communities, we need a lot of security to protect the people there; because, without being in the RACs, you cannot move into the polling units to actually conduct the election.
Elections will take eight hours or less because now accreditation and voting have been fused so you simultaneous do accreditation and voting, and election stops by 2.00pm. That means commencement of election should be at exactly 8 am so that we can accommodate every person who will come out to vote. That is why the materials are domiciled in those areas and that is why the Commission has chosen the RACs.
So, it becomes a challenge where somebody will now want to invade those places. But even if you invade the place, you will not benefit from anything because immediately you invade the place and collect materials, we will cancel the election in that area. We will not only cancel it, we will fix another day for the election.
Even at that, I don’t see it as a challenge because the people of Rivers State will rise up to the occasion and put a lie to all the negative reports that have been written about them. At the end of the day everyone will know that there are mature people in Rivers State who can handle issues.
Reasons For Vote Cancelation?
Cancelation of election, if you have followed the trend in recent times it has always been as a result of violence. Violence constitutes more than 80% of the reason for election cancelation. So, we think that if we have a conducive environment, that is devoid of violence, definitely, we will deliver. Violence is a major challenge to elections, people not being allowed to do the proper thing.
Issue Of The Card Reader
People misunderstand the issue of the card reader. The card reader is an instrument that was made to compliment the register in the process of accreditation. Because of the dishonesty that was involved in the accreditation process, we now introduced a device that will ascertain the number of persons at the polling unit.
People take authentication as a failure of the card reader. The card reader does not fail. The card reader is meant to do three major things; the first one is just the authentication which is minor. The major thing is that INEC recognises that there are cloned cards, so the card reader will only authenticate that this card is an INEC card. It will ascertain that the person standing before you is a registered voter in that unit. Thirdly, it will also authenticate that the person standing before you has not brought that card before. The authentication is secondary in that even those who are not authenticated but are established as registered voters will be allowed to vote.
Prof. Amupitan gave the warning on Saturday, in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, during the South-South Zonal Readiness Assessment and Interactive Staff Engagement organised ahead of the 2027 general elections.
He said insecurity remained a potential challenge to the electoral process but stressed that the Commission would not allow threats against its personnel to undermine its constitutional responsibilities.
“Insecurity may pose a challenge, but our collective constitutional resolve is far stronger. Let me again send a clear message from Port Harcourt: anyone who attempts to threaten, intimidate, or harm our ad-hoc staff, NYSC members, or permanent personnel will be brought to justice under the full weight of the law,” he said.
The INEC Chairman, who was accompanied by National Commissioners, directors and technical aides, disclosed that the South-South engagement was the fifth in a series of zonal assessments, following similar exercises in the South-West, North-West, South-East and North-East.
He explained that his physical presence across the geopolitical zones reflected the Commission’s field-first approach, emphasising that electoral integrity must be established through effective operations at the grassroots.
According to him, the assessment would cover operational preparedness across the 123 Local Government Areas in the six South-South states.
On election security, Prof. Amupitan said INEC had moved away from reactive security arrangements traditionally activated around election day to a proactive, intelligence-driven framework known as the “ICCES Tentacle”.
He explained that the framework was designed to extend inter-agency security coordination from national and state headquarters to local government areas and Registration Area Centres, including remote communities.
He identified three critical pillars of the framework as mapping and mitigating security threats, protecting electoral personnel and infrastructure, and guaranteeing safe access to polling units.
The INEC boss said the security arrangement would provide comprehensive protection for electoral personnel, technological infrastructure, including Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) devices and server infrastructure, as well as voters.
He added that the framework was intended to ensure that every polling unit, irrespective of its geographical location or history of security challenges, remained safe and accessible for the exercise of democratic rights.
Prof. Amupitan disclosed that the South-South security architecture comprised approximately 60 major operational formations, headquarters and state commands operating under the Inter-Agency Consultative Committee on Election Security (ICCES).
The network, he said, brings together military, naval, air, police and other security and intelligence agencies across the six states.
“Together, this integrated multi-agency network represents the operational backbone that guarantees intelligence-led protection across every riverine creek, coastal axis, and land-based polling unit in the Niger Delta,” he stated.
Providing an overview of the region’s electoral significance, the INEC Chairman said the South-South had the fourth-largest voting bloc in the country, with 15,823,550 registered voters, representing 15.30 per cent of the national register.
Rivers State alone, he said, accounts for 3,736,434 registered voters spread across the 23 local government areas.
Alhaji Abubakar made the demand following revelations that some INEC registration officers allegedly abused their access to the voter registration system to introduce irregular records into the database.
In a statement issued by his Director of Strategic Communications, Mr Phrank Shaibu, the former vice-president described the development as a serious breach of the Commission’s internal safeguards and raised concerns about the integrity of the electoral process.
He urged INEC to identify the officials implicated in the alleged misconduct and explain what disciplinary or legal measures had been taken against them.
Alhaji Abubakar also called for an independent forensic audit of the preliminary voters’ register to establish the scale of the alleged manipulation, identify affected records and determine how the questionable entries were introduced into the system.
He further insisted that INEC preserve all relevant voter records, image files, system access logs and electronic audit trails to prevent the destruction or alteration of evidence before an independent examination could be conducted.
The former vice-president also demanded that the Commission disclose the identities of companies contracted to produce sensitive election materials ahead of the 2027 polls, arguing that transparency was essential to building public confidence in the electoral process.
INEC’s Director of Information and Communication Technology, Dr Lawrence Bayode, had earlier disclosed during a television interview that some registration officers across the country allegedly used their official login credentials to introduce irregularities into the voters’ database.
Dr Bayode explained that the Commission’s Automated Biometric Identification System helped identify questionable records and establish how some irregularities entered the system.
He, however, clarified that not all suspicious photographs were AI-generated, as some resulted from poor registration procedures.
The development followed public concerns over suspected AI-generated photographs, alleged duplicate entries and other inconsistencies discovered in the preliminary voters’ register published online on October 26, 2026.
INEC has maintained that the published document is a preliminary register and that it is reviewing questionable records ahead of the certification of the final Register of Voters.
The controversy has intensified calls for greater transparency and accountability in the management of the voters’ register as preparations gather momentum for the 2027 general elections.
-
Rivers3 days ago
Don Seeks Repositioning Of Tech Education For Dev
-
Education3 days agoPAMO MEDICAL UNIVERSITY -Nullifies Arrest warrant on VC
-
Niger Delta3 days ago
PANDEF Seeks 50% Oil Derivation Allocation Increase
-
Education3 days agoIAUE MOVES TO END GHOST WORKERS SYNDROME AS 400 NEW NON-TEACHING STAFF UNDERGO MANDATORY ETHICS TRAINING
-
News3 days agoFresh Ebola Scare As NCDC Records Two Cases
-
News3 days ago
Customs Partners EFCC, NDLEA, Others To Tackle Money Laundering, Terrorism Financing
-
Politics3 days ago2027: RIVERS GUBER CANDIDATES SIGN CHARTER TO PRIORITIZE CITIZENS’ DEMANDS
-
Politics3 days ago2027: South-East Govs Insist On Tinubu’s Re-election