In its Watching The Vote statement on the process and results of the 2020 governorship election in Edo State, Yiaga Africa called on the winning candidate and his supporters to be magnanimous in victory.
In the statement signed by Ezenwa Nwagwu and Aisha Abdullahi(both co-chairs, Yiaga Africa WTV Working Group) the group called on the losers “to accept the results because they reflect the votes cast.”
The non-profit making organisation called on “all candidates, all parties and all Nigerians to show political maturity and to maintain the peace.”
To arrive at its findings, Yiaga Africa WTV claimed that among others, on the election day it employed the PVT methodology and deployed 500 stationary observers in pairs to a representative statistical sample of 250 polling units, and 25 mobile observers located in all 18 local election areas in the state. It also deployed 19 collation centre observers to each of the 18 local government areas collation centres and the state collation centre.
“Given the significant rate of procedural infractions around counting of spoilt and counterfoil ballot paper, Yiagra Africa recommends better training for election day INEC ad-hoc officials. While these infractions do not undermine the integrity of the process, they are a sign that election day officials’ training can be improved.
“Yiaga Africa notes that the Edo governorship election is an improvement on Kogi and Bayelsa 2019 governorship elections and recommends INEC take all necessary steps to address challenges seen in the election before the Info State governorship election on October 10, 2020. Yiaga Africa encourages INEC to address logistical challenges observed relating to late commencement of polls for the upcoming gubernatorial election in Ondo State.
“In addition, INEC should ensure it enforces adherence to the Covid-19 health protocols in the Ondo election. The National Assembly should accelerate reforms to the electoral act to legalize electronic transmission of results as the INEC results viewing portal deployed for the election has demonstrated how citizens’ access to polling units results increases the integrity of the electoral process and encourages acceptability of electoral outcomes.”
