The Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, on Sunday declared open the National Collation Centre for the Saturday’s presidential election.
The centre is situated in the International Conference Centre (ICC), Abuja.
Yakubu, while declaring the rules for the collation of the results, said that the presidential election result from each state would be presented by the State Collation Officers for Presidential Election (SCOPE).
He said the officers would be accompanied by the Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) of the state.
He said that the Commission was still awaiting results from all the states, including the Federal Capital Territoty (FCT).
“From today the collation centre is hereby declared open until the final determination of the 2019 Presidential election.
“During the course of proceedings, there may be interludes or adjournments. This will be announced by the returning officer as the need arises.
“At the moment, no SCOPE is around. Some of them are expected tonight. Accordingly, proceedings are hereby adjourned.
“We will reconvene at 11 a.m. tomorrow Monday, Feb. 25, 2019 for the collation of results,” he said.
Some of the ground rules read by Yakubu was that the SCOPE shall announce the scores of each political parties in the state, including the report of cancellations and areas where elections did not hold.
“The returning officer then invited comments and observations from the polling agents.
“The Returning Officer requests the SCOPE to hand over the original copy of form EC8B.
” When all the SCOPES have presented their results, the returning officer shall display the sealed copies of the result sheets, EC8BA, which is the summary of results of elections on state by state basis.
“The EC8E, which is the declaration of result of the election and EC40G3 which is the summary of registered voters in polling units where elections were cancelled or not held,” he said.
“The returning officer then completes form EC8B and announces the votes scored by each political party and thereafter invites the poling agents to endorse the form.”
Yakubu said that after completing the necessary forms, the returning officer would compare and ascertain the forms and thereafter make declaration of winner.
He appealed to all stakeholders to keep by the rules set for the proceeding.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that some of the stakeholders present at the ceremony include accredited observers, media, diplomatic corps and party agents.
Representatives of political parties at the Centre were the All Progressives Congress (APC), represented by Hameed Ali, the Comptroller General of the Nigerian Customs Service and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) represented by Mr Usman Bugaje.
Others include the Young Progressives Party (YPP), Allied Peoples Congress of Nigeria, All Grand Alliance, and the Justice Must Prevail Party (JMPP).
NAN reports that 73 political parties participated in the Presidential election which was held in the 36 states of the federation and the FCT.
