Ahead of the 2019 general elections, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has highlighted how Nigerians who have been displaced by conflicts and terrorism would not be
disenfranchised.
As result of the insurgency in the North-East, farmer/herder crisis and other communal conflicts across states in the country, the national chairman of the commission said there is need to factor in
the Internally Displaces Persons (IDPs) so that they can also exercise their voting rights in the 2019 general elections.
The chairman of the commission, Mahmood Yakubu, said this at a stakeholder’s variation conference on the framework for IDP voting in Abuja.
The conference was brought together by INEC, the National Assembly committees on elections, United States Agency for International Development (USAID), United Kingdom Department for International
Development (UKAID), International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES), and Security Agencies.
The aim of the conference is to draft a framework for voters to vote in different states. The framework classifies IDPs into interstate and intrastate IDPs. Intrastate are displaced persons still in their state
of registration while interstate IDPs are persons displaced and found in camps different from their state of registration.
The chairman of the IDP voting committee, Okechukwu Ibeano, said the intrastate IDPs shall participate in all election categories while interstate shall only participate in presidential election in order to
limit the challenges associated with political perception and suspicion over transmission of results across state borders, as well as constituency boundaries.
The framework, which seeks to approve e-collation of results from IDPs camps, specified that results from partially displaced intrastate IDP will be merged at the Registration Area (RA) level using IDP special result sheets.
For interstate IDPs, results merging shall be at the state level for the presidential election while the location of RA and local government area collation centers in affected areas shall be determined by the safety of location.
It also stated that this will be achieved by collaboration between Resident Electoral Commissioners (RECs) of affected states with the IDPs.
He said the RECs will make electoral resources required for a successful interstate IDP voting available and will make adequate special arrangements to distribute Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs).
