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The Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Joash Amupitan, has announced that 14 political parties will participate in the August 15 governorship election in Osun State, while assuring voters that the commission has strengthened both its technological and security frameworks to guarantee a credible poll.
Speaking during an interactive session with media executives at the INEC office in Osogbo on Saturday, Amupitan disclosed that about 32,000 members of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) would be engaged as ad hoc staff through the commission\'s sanitised INECPRES portal.
He revealed that Osun State has a total of 2,339,233 registered voters spread across 3,763 polling units in 320 wards and the state\'s 30 local government areas.
Earlier in the day, the INEC Chairman led a delegation comprising national commissioners, the Resident Electoral Commissioner, directors and technical officials on an inspection of the ongoing mock accreditation exercise across selected polling units in the state\'s three senatorial districts to assess the performance of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS).
According to Amupitan, the mock accreditation exercise serves as a quality assurance mechanism aimed at testing the commission\'s technological infrastructure under real election conditions. He said the BVAS recorded impressive performance, with voter verification taking between 30 seconds and two minutes using either fingerprint or facial recognition.
He added that the commission had deployed additional backup BVAS devices and technical support personnel to every registration area to ensure immediate replacement of any malfunctioning device during the election.
Responding to concerns raised by some political parties over the number of BVAS machines available for the poll, Amupitan said INEC increased the devices earmarked for the election from 4,427 to 5,130, while backup units were doubled from 664 to 1,328 to cater for polling units with large voter populations in Ife East, Irewole, Egbedore, Ede North and Osogbo.
The INEC Chairman also expressed concern over reports of political violence and intimidation, describing insecurity as a serious threat to the credibility of the electoral process.
He said the commission had adopted a proactive security strategy through the Inter-Agency Consultative Committee on Election Security (ICCES), working closely with security agencies to safeguard election personnel, materials and voters.
Amupitan assured that intelligence-driven security operations would be deployed across polling units and collation centres, warning that anyone attempting to disrupt the election would face the full weight of the law.
He further disclosed that INEC was collaborating with national security agencies and community leaders to de-escalate tensions, while strengthening logistics security to guarantee the safe movement of election materials.
Meanwhile, the Osun State chapter of the Accord Party has called on INEC to urgently review the configuration of its BVAS machines following anomalies allegedly observed during the mock accreditation exercise.
In a statement signed by the party\'s state chairman, Victor Akande, the party urged the commission to conduct a comprehensive technical audit involving relevant stakeholders to address the identified issues before election day.
The party maintained that with less than two weeks to the governorship election, INEC must demonstrate full readiness by ensuring reliable, transparent and efficient deployment of technology throughout the electoral process.
