Rivers LG polls: Yiaga Africa raises concern over non-compulsory usage of BVAS

Yiaga Africa, a civil society organisation (CSO), has raised concerns over the use of manual accreditation of voters during Saturday’s LG election in Rivers state.

Earlier, the Rivers State Independent Electoral Commission (RSIEC) organised elections across 23 LGAs in the state.

The Rivers LGA elections were held amid controversy over whether a democratic process should take place during a state of emergency or under a sole administrator.

In an interview with Channels Television, Cynthia Mbamalu, the programme director of Yiaga Africa, said the non-usage of bimodal voter accreditation system (BVAS) during election raises questions on the quality of the process.

Mbamalu argued that BVAS should have been deployed for the Rivers LGA polls, adding that the electoral act mandates the same procedures for area council elections in the federal capital territory and local government elections in the states.

She said since the supreme court annulled the October 2024 Rivers LGA elections due to non-compliance to electoral act, the recent election should have been conducted in line with the law.

“It is not about the election happening, it is the quality of the process. I think that is where the bigger question is,” she said.

“Section 150 of the electoral act clearly stated that LGA elections must be connected in the same manner as the area council elections in the federal capital territory.

“As simple as the deployment of the BVAS for accreditation of voters ought to be part of the LGA election by the provisions of the electoral act and the logic of the supreme court, which said that the 2024 Rivers LGA elections did not comply with the provisions of the electoral act.

“Following the news and reports from the field in Rivers, I observed that there is application of manual accreditation without compulsory use of BVAS.

“This raises a big question on whether the procedure of the election comply with the legal framework for the election.”