THE Election Analysis Centre (EAC) of the Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD) has said it was shocked by the postponement of the general elections by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
INEC announced in the early hours of Saturday that presidential and parliamentary elections due yesterday would be rescheduled for next Saturday, February 23, while gubernatorial and state houses of assembly elections earlier scheduled for March 2 would be shifted to March 9.
“Our surprise stems from repeated reassurances from INEC that it was fully ready to conduct the elections and that there was no possibility of postponement,” the EAC said in a statement signed by the director of CDD, Idayat Hassan, and Adele Jinadu who leads the EAC.
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“We recognise that elections represent a huge logistical challenge, particularly as the 2019 elections is the largest in Nigeria’s history and the largest in Africa. However, we were hopeful that lessons from the 2011 and 2015 elections would have been learnt by 2019,” the statement added.
In addition, the EAC called on INEC to ensure it takes urgent steps to reassure Nigerian and the international community that it will be ready to conduct free, fair and credible elections on the new dates.
However, the EAC maintained that it was worried certain sensitive materials had already been deployed in various parts of the country and urged INEC to urgently affirm to the public that these materials would be safe.
“We hope that INEC will take advantage of the extra time provided by the postponement of the elections to rapidly and robustly address any weaknesses in project management, logistics management and public communication,” the centre said.
“There is an urgent need to re-energise Nigerians to turn out to vote so as to avoid voter apathy, and we call on civil society and the media to assist in this process.”
Finally, the group is asking Nigerians to not allow the postponement stop them from turning out to vote next Saturday.
“We also urge all members of the international community to keep faith with the Nigerian electoral process and to continue to support Nigeria in preserving what is, this year, twenty continuous years of democratic rule in Nigeria,” the statement read.
The centre for electoral analysis was launched by the CDD on Thursday to serve as a one-stop shop for the collation and review of information surrounding the 2019 general elections in the country. The centre also has the mandate to debunk different kinds of misinformation and untrue propaganda circulated during the period.