SAN FRANCISCO, June 23, (THEWILL) – The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has succeeded in retrieving a back-up Direct Data Capture (DDC) machine on what transpired between Governor Yahaya Bello of Kogi State and INEC the team in its ongoing investigation of the allegation of double registration levelled against Bello.
The machine will also assist in determining how the governor’s name later on disappeared from the Continuous Voters Register while INEC was probing the governor’s double registration status.
INEC is expected to engage experts in the next few days to download the data in the back-up machine, which is being protected under heavy security.
THEWILL recalls that INEC National Commissioner and chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee (IVEC), Prince Solomon Soyebi, first raised the alarm over the alleged double registration by the governor.
He alleged that the governor first registered in Abuja in January 2011 and subsequently registered for the second time on Tuesday May 23, 2017 in Government House, Lokoja.
“It has come to the attention of INEC that Governor Bello of Kogi State registered as a voter for the second time on Tuesday May 23, 2017 in Government House, Lokoja, the state capital,” he said.
“His first registration was on January 30, 2011 in Wuse Zone 4, Abuja.
“The governor’s double registration and doing so outside lNEC’s designated centres are both illegal.
“We wish to make it clear that no INEC staff was authorised by the commission to re-register him or any citizen or to do so outside our designated CVR centres.”
But the governor said his ghost might have been registered by INEC because he was away to Dubai at the time he was accused of double registration.
“I travelled on 19th to Dubai for a brief break and I saw the press release and I was taken aback, that I did double registration on 23rd,” Bello said.
“Probably it is my ghost that has done the double registration.”
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