Only 55.6% of 80,410 agents submitted for Edo guber polls -INECl

Ahead of the upcoming Edo State Governorship Election, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, has disclosed that only 55.6% of the expected polling and collation agents have been submitted by political parties

Out of the 80,410 agents anticipated, only 44,687 were uploaded to INEC’s portal by the deadline.

In a statement by the National Commissioner and Chairman of the Information and Voter Education Committee, Sam Olumekun, INEC revealed that the portal for uploading agent details opened on July 17, 2024, and automatically closed at midnight on July 30, 2024. Despite having 4,519 polling units and 211 collation centres across the state, only three out of the 17 political parties participating in the election submitted agents for all levels of polling and collation.

The breakdown of the submissions includes 43,043 polling agents, 1,452 ward agents, 179 Local Government agents, and 13 State collation agents. INEC noted that one political party did not submit any agent details at all.

The statement reads: “The Commission met today, Thursday 8th August 2024 and, among other matters, reviewed the ongoing preprataions for the Edo and Ondo State Governorship elections.

“Nigerians may recall that since 2020, the Commission had replaced the manual process for accreditation of observers, media, polling and collation agents with dedicated portals to which the required information, including photographs, is uploaded. Political parties were subsequently required to upload the details of their agents for polling units and collation centres for all elections.

“For the Edo State Governorship Election, the portal opened on 17th July 2024 and automatically shut down at midnight on 30th July 2024 as indicated on item 9 on the Timetable and Schedule of Activities for the election released almost a year ago in September 2023.

“In Edo State, there are 4,519 polling units and 211 collation centres, comprising 192 ward centres, 18 Local Government centres and the State collation centre in Benin city. A political party fielding candidate in the election is expected to nominate 4,730 agents.

“From the 17 parties participating in the election, the Commission expected a cumulative figure of 80,410 agents. However, only 44,687 were uploaded to the portal made up of 43,043 polling, 1,452 ward, 179 Local Government and 13 State collation agents. Put together, the 17 political parties nominated 55.6% of the expected number of agents.

‘Three political parties uploaded the details of their agents for all levels of polling and collation while one party has no single agent for any level of voting or collation.

“A summary of the submissions by political parties has been uploaded to our website and social media platforms for public information.”