INEC Explains Reasons for Challenges with Result Viewing Portal

The independent national electoral commission National Commissioner and Chairman Information and Voter Committee, Festus Okoye, on Sunday signed a statement where he acknowledged the challenges faced by the commission’s Result Viewing Portal (IReV).  He associated the issues to technical hitches related to the scaling up of the platform.

The portal has been reportedly slow and unsteady which can cause a lot of discrepancies in the collation of the electoral results.

There have been speculations that the challenges are as a result of an interruption and disruption of their system. 

Festus in the statement assured that the hitches had nothing to do with any interruption or disruption of their server. He added that the IRev platform is well secured and that their technical team are working to solve all the associated problems. He also said that INEC acknowledges the importance of IReV in managing the result process, thus the need to fix the issue quickly.

The statement from Festus reads  “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.”

‘Our technical team is working assiduously to solve all the outstanding problems, and users of the IReV would have noticed improvements since last night.’

There have been various reported cases of Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) during the presidential and National Assembly elections which led to the delay in voting processes. A lot of voters and stakeholders have questioned the credibility of INEC over the inability to upload the collated election results.

INEC spokesman further added that results issued by political parties are safe on the portal and can never be altered. He addressed that all issues or discrepancies would be thoroughly investigated and remediated.

He acknowledged the errors and affirmed that the INEC took full responsibility for the problems and distress they have caused political parties, candidates and the electorate while appreciating the concerns of the public and their various suggestions.