By Friday Olokor and Gift Habib
The Independent National Electoral Commission on Sunday said it was fully aware of the challenges with the INEC Results Viewing Portal also known IReV.
This was contained in a statement signed by the National Commissioner and Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee, Festus Okoye.
Okoye noted that the portal was only experiencing challenges and not sabotage, adding that the IReV was safe.
The statement read, “The commission is aware of challenges with the INEC Results Viewing Portal. Unlike in off-season elections where the portal was used, it has been relatively slow and unsteady. The commission regrets this setback, especially because of the importance of IReV in our results management process.
“The problem is totally due to technical hitches related to scaling up the IReV from a platform for managing off-season, state elections, to one for managing nationwide general elections. It is indeed not unusual for glitches to occur and be corrected in such situations.
“Consequently, the commission wishes to assure Nigerians that the challenges are not due to any intrusion or sabotage of our systems, and that the IReV remains well-secured. Our technical team is working assiduously to solve all the outstanding problems, and users of the IReV would have noticed improvements since last night.
“We also wish to assure Nigerians that the results from the polling units, copies of which were issued to political parties, are safe on both the BVAS and the IReV portal. These results cannot be tampered with and any discrepancy between them and the physical results used in collation will be thoroughly investigated and remediated, in line with Section 65 of the Electoral Act 2022.”
Okoye said INEC appreciated the concerns of the public on the situation and urged people to desist from “statements and actions that can heat up the polity.”
“We take full responsibility for the problems and regret the distress that they have caused the candidates, political parties and the electorate,” added.
Source: The Punch
