by Ranti Joseph
Pre-election trial of the card reader devices by the Independent Electoral Commission (INEC) was held in some states on Saturday.
There was a high turnout of registered voters in some centres while others recorded had few voters.
Reports say residents of Egwa-Gwada area of Shiroro Local Government Area started coming out as early as 8am to participate in the exercise.
INEC Commissioner Niger, Kaduna, Kwara and the FCT, Chris Iyimoga, told newsmen that the whole exercise were encouraging. “The turnout is good as of this early hour of the exercise. We have all the card readers in place with additional ones as backups. The pace of screening has been smooth. In some instances, where there were delays, it was not due to the machines. The reading may reject the fingers, because of blurred capturing. But, by and large, this has been identified and rectified,” he said.
Also in Delta, there was a massive turnout as potential voters at the Umuezei Ward in Oshimili South Local Government Area of Delta State expressed their delight at the efficiency of the device deployed in the polling units.
INEC and voters alike reported to the 14 voting units promptly at the 8am scheduled beginning of the exercise and went into business soon afterwards. The ward has a total voting population of 13,905. But only 10,865 voters had collected their PVC, according to the Resident Electoral Commissioner, Anidi Ikowak.
Most of the verification went on smoothly, taking just a few seconds for the polling officials to interview and test each voter with the card reader. But there were a few cases where the process caused anxious moments as it took several trials before the card reader could verify the few voters.
One of such incidents occurred at Polling Unit 12 in Delta where an elderly woman, Franca Oba, waited for almost 30 minutes before her fingerprint was accepted by the card reader.
Unlike other voters that just came and had their fingerprints verified within a few seconds, Oba had to avail all her 10 fingers for verification for seven times before the reader verified hers. “The card reader is good. But if every voter has to go through this, then it means people will not leave the polling unit before midnight,” she said.
