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.